Chapter 7
The flyer came crashing down through the floors and rafters of the temple tower with a thundering clatter, sending dust and shrapnel flying in its wake. Link's ears were ringing with the sound of the fall and the sound of his own screams, completely unable to control the plummeting craft as it snowballed through floor after floor of the old tower. There was a metallic twang, and Link saw one of the dragonfly wings of his little escape craft come tearing off and go whirling away into the mess of tumbling debris all around him. The cockpit hit a massive stone and went bouncing like a rubber ball from one wall to the other, rattling Link around inside the little brass sphere like a rupee in a beggar's cup. Finally, the little flyer came smashing down on solid rock with a bang, throwing Link on his back. For a few moments, sand and wreckage could be heard, pouring down atop the thing, and dwindling away into slighter and slighter noises till Link was left alone in a sudden and unnerving silence.
The boy coughed and wretched, his stomach rising up in his throat with the nausea of his spiraling descent. The flyer had landed on its side, and the glass of the windshield had exploded with the impact. Scraping his arms and knees, Link pushed his way out the narrow gap it had made, cutting himself lightly on the shoulder and forearms but not enough to really be a bother. Forcing his way through the shattered windshield, he came flopping out with a thud on the bleached-white stones of the temple floor, which felt rough and overgrown with moss. Link sprawled there for a moment on his back, sucking down air in deep, ragged breaths.
Up above, sunlight shone brilliantly through the spot in the high stone ceiling where his ship had come crashing through. A rolling cloud of dust was still settling in the air above, revealing itself like a passing ghost as the sunlight cut a swath across it. He had done it! He was in the temple, and as close to in one piece as he could have hoped for.
Once he had caught his breath, Link sat up to have a better look around and get his bearings. The room he was in was enormous, likely one of the central chambers of the massive temple. It appeared that the place he had come to rest was the top landing of a giant set of stairs, which wrapped around the dome-shaped walls of the room at a shallow incline, but the flight leading down to the next landing had crumbled away countless years ago. He was left stranded on a little island outcrop of stone, high, high above the temple floor.
This was only one of the incredible visual marvels to take in though, for just as one might have expected from a place called "The Temple of Life", the entire room seemed a kind of giant atrium, a self-contained greenhouse of flourishing jungle life, which crept up the walls in brilliant vines as thick as a person's arms. From every balcony and bannister the hanging fronds of tropical trees stuck out like great fans of green, beset with every kind of flower, fern, and shrub. Butterflies and fairy gnats played on the unseen currents of the air. Somewhere down below a bird of paradise hooted pleasantly. The wall furthest from Link was partially caved in, and a mighty waterfall came spilling into the living chamber, its cascades echoing musically across the entire lush expanse of the temple.
"Wow," was all Link could manage to say.
He carefully stepped to the edge of the ancient landing, his boots causing the centuries old tile to crumble a bit, almost making him fall. Regaining his balance, he peered down to the depths of the massive room. Down below, maybe ninety or a hundred feet, a stone pathway marked a possible road through an otherwise overgrown canopy of tropical jungle. He spotted a group of figures down below following this road, which would lead them to the base of the waterfall. When he saw that the one in the lead was Captain Scarlett he hit the floor to try to hide himself from the pirate's menacing gaze.
Scarlett was tramping along, swinging her cutlass wildly at hanging vines and brush which encroached upon their path. Behind her, Gwen was pulling Zelda along by the arm. The Princess was hanging her head in resigned despair, allowing Gwen to lead her. In the rear, Link recognized the lithe forms of Kef and Zig, Captain Scarlett's favorite crew members save for First Mate Gwendolin herself.
So Zelda was still alive! There was still time to save her if Link acted quickly, but he was stuck up on the landing and had no idea where in the dungeon the pirates might be taking the Princess. He went back to the wreckage of the flyer, searching around for some oth er way off the landing.
It appeared that there had been a doorway leading off the landing to some other part of the temple, but Link's crashing entrance had completely caved it in. He was stuck! Come so far just to get stuck up in the air once again, and who knew how far behind him the rest of Scarlett's pirates were? Surely they would come to warn the captain of his treachery. Link closed his eyes and rubbed the bridge of his nose, willing his brain to gift him with some sort of plan.
There was no direct route down, aside from the obvious leap of certain death, but perhaps there was a way around. He went over to the remnants of the ancient bannister, where the crumbled stair had once adjoined with the temple wall. The roots and vines that clung to the wall looked thick and sturdy, and Link decided that they might hold his weight if he gripped them tightly and climbed across them like a ladder. Link resisted the urge to glance down once more to the temple floor so many stories below and began to search for footing on the overgrown wall.
Finding a good place to make way, he gripped the roots and learned that they were sturdy enough at least for the time being. Moving carefully but at a steady pace, he went like a spider crab, crawling sideways across the dangling vines, his heart pounding as he tried not to think about the deadly fall below. Seconds later, he was nearly halfway across to the next landing and he began to feel a little more confident. His hand came to rest on a thick vine of startling blue. The sound of shivering leaves made his heart jump.
The blue vine began to writhe in his grip and his right foot lost its hold on the precarious wall. The vine he gripped in his left hand gave way just a bit, its roots snapping like fishing lines as he dropped three feet down and came to an elastic stop. Above him, where the blue vine had been, a dekubaba the size of a man was shaking its fronds at him and hissing grossly.
Link felt a lump in his chest and tried not to look at the hungry carnivorous plant as it sputtered and clicked at him. The boy checked his footing and began to crawl along the wall once more, glancing warily ahead for any wriggling blue vines.
After a harrowing climb across the perilous wall of overgrowth, Link was glad to see solid stones under his feet. He let himself drop to the ground lightly and dusted the leaves and dirt off of his tunic.
The landing he had arrived at was in better condition than the one he had crashed the flyer on. A ten-foot archway of bone-white stone crowned a door set in the wall and the spiraling staircase twisted away further down the wall of the massive room. Link glanced over the bannister and saw that Scarlett and her pirates had taken Zelda somewhere further in the temple. He decided that, wherever they were going, he'd have a better chance cutting them off somewhere deeper in the temple than going all the way down to the ground floor and trying to catch up to them. He went to try the door.
The handle and lock, if there had been one, had long since crumbled away. Link was able to drag the stone door painstakingly free of its frame. Darkness greeted him on the other side, a narrow stone hallway of roots and vines and hanging moss, which had laid unmolested by the feet of interlopers and treasure seekers for untold eons. Link pulled the door as wide as he could to let light spill in.
He went inside, crawling on his hands over the massive roots, which crisscrossed the path, running in and out of giant holes they had bored patiently with their centuries of unchecked growth. The path was uneven and the overgrowth left him panting from exhaustion with his efforts of climbing, jumping, and scrabbling through it. As he went on, the light began to dwindle more and more, and he could tell by the slant of the ceiling that his path was descending at a low incline deeper into the ancient temple. He could hear snakes slithering, and the scamper of unseen rats in the wake of his trundling charge through the underbrush, but he moved on unafraid with no thought in his mind but the urgent need to get to Zelda before Scarlett could harm her.
Eventually Link came to a place where a dim and phosphorescent glow was visible on the foliage ahead. Pushing aside a hanging curtain of moss he revealed a sight so beautiful and unexpected that he had to stop and stare in wordless wonder for a moment before he dared to go closer.
Stretching down the hallway before him and away around the corner, a forest of mushrooms tall as men was glowing brightly enough to light the path. The fungi were massive and their caps hung overhead like the canopies of ancient trees. Each of their caps and stalks glowed a different color of fluorescent, psychedelic rainbow light.
Link stepped out into the forest of fungus, letting the strange glow of the eerie plants wash over him, casting his skin in lightning blue, electric pink and glowing eldritch purple. He meandered on through the glowing forest as in a dream, his fingertips brushing the cold and clammy surface of the glowing stalks as he went.
"Krrrrrruk!" the frog-like sound came echoing down the hall somewhere behind him, and he turned in a flash to peer warily down the hall of glowing fungus for its source. Silence greeted him. The glowing rainbow forest seemed devoid of life. Link dropped down into a crouch, scraping around in the creep of living vines and roots for something heavy enough to defend himself with. His hands clasped the end of something firm, and he tore it free from the underbrush with a grunt.
He held his prize up to the dim, rainbow light and saw it was a hefty stick of deku wood, snapped at one end and still firm enough of substance to make a decent club. Link gave one more look to the silent forest behind him before continuing on down the hall with his new prize. He had no doubts that something hidden was watching him from the cover of the glowing mushroom stalks, but he had no time to sit and lay in waiting. Zelda needed him, and if something intended to try to stop him they had better get it over with because he wasn't going to wait around to find out.
After a few more minutes of tramping through the weird glow of the mushroom forest, the croaking came again, but closer at his heels. "Krrrrrrrrruk!"
Link whirled around once more, his deku club raised to swing like a bat at anything that might pop up. The empty forest surrounded him, and there was no sign of the thing that had made the croaking sound. Link narrowed his eyes suspiciously, listening so hard he could hear is own deep, deliberate breathing. The rainbow of glowing mushrooms twinkled and shimmered all around him. He held his ground.
A shadow flickered across his peripheral vision. Link swung wildly, striking the stalk of a mushroom and carving a chuck right out of the soft fungus. There was nothing there. Link turned round and round, searching for his assailant, but there was nothing there!
"Come on out and fight!" cried the boy.
Another shimmer of movement caught his eye, and he spun around on his heel. At first, it seemed as though the forest itself was coming to life, as the very meat of one of the mushroom stalks came lunging at him, but as the shifting pattern of colors came sliding from its clever hiding spot in plain sight, he saw it for what it really was. Huge hands with skinny digits, suction cupped at the end, came reaching for him. A smiling mouth gaped at him from under dead eyes. The horrible purple tongue came lolling out, then snapped at him like a rubber band. Link hit the floor to avoid being gobbled by the giant, chameleon-skinned frog.
Link screamed, swinging the club wildly at the beast. Thwack! He struck the thing squarely in the side, and it croaked pitifully. The blow staggered the monster. Link took the opportunity to get back to his feet before the creature attacked again with renewed resolve. Now the thing was watching him warily, strafing around him on gangly legs, waiting for an opening to strike. Link brandished the club and waved it threateningly at the beast, but he wasn't willing to risk being tagged by that sickly purple tongue to get a good swat on it.
Link had lived in the forest for years, and watched the comings and goings of the deku scrubs, faery folk and mysterious skull children. He had learned much of the ways of the natural world. Strange and colorful frogs with sickly purple tongues reeked of poison and he had no desire to test his theory that the creature's slimy mucous was quite noxious.
He nearly tripped over a root poking out from the loamy ground, and the monster took the chance to strike. Link was barely able to lean out of the way of the slimy purple tongue as it came hurtling out of the gaping, smiling mouth. It hit the stalk of the mushroom next to him with a wet thud and stuck there like a spit ball. Link smiled at the un-blinking, dead eyes of the thing and brought his club down like a hammer on the knot at the end of the beast's tongue.
"Kruuuuukkk!" the thing moaned horribly, and its roars and sputters were disgusting. The putrid purple tongue went rolling back into its mouth, and the jaws clenched shut to guard the sensitive appendage from any further assault.
Link was on the offensive. Taking three steps forward, once more he swung his bat and caught the monster right between the eyes. The beast gurgled and croaked ghoulishly at the pain. Link took a step back and watched as the beast turned tail, scampering away into the mushroom forest as quickly as its gangly, hopping legs would carry it.
"Yeah, you just try that again!" he cried after it, "I'll see to it that you croak your last croak!"
Link watched the silent, glowing forest for a minute, waiting to see if the thing would come back for another go. After a time of silence, he decided that it was gone. He turned to continue on his path deeper into the old, musty temple.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Some floors below, the Princess and her captors were getting closer to their goal. The four fearsome pirates faced all the horrors of the forbidden temple with iron resolve, dispatching angry dekubabas and mischievous deku scrubs without skipping a beat. Zelda hated to admit it, but she admired the way that Gwen and Scarlett could face death so stalwartly. She secretly wished to have such courage. True, her devotion to her kingdom and her people was absolute, but in the face of danger and death she had proven herself little more than a scared child. When Nyarlath had attacked her father and locked her away in the dungeon she was completely powerless to stop him. Now her father lay under the same curse which had nearly killed Link and there was no certainty that he would ever awaken, which left her the only successor to the throne. Even if they could save Hyrule from Nyarlath, how could she be the queen when she was unable to even protect herself? Queens protected entire countries. They were strong and powerful. She was nothing like that.
Yet Link had survived the curse somehow, so maybe her father could as well. She had wanted to ask him if he had any clue how he had woken up, but there was never a moment they had together when the pirates weren't watching like hawks, listening to their every word. No good could come of those pirates knowing anything about magic or breaking curses. It was bad enough they thought they could just go around abducting whoever they please and forcing them to work like slaves.
Scarlett led them down a long, open hallway, lined with standing columns, several of which had toppled to the ground, or were missing pieces entirely. Up ahead, a short set of stairs led up five steps to a massive double door, wrapped in golden chains, and sealed by a golden lock in the shape of a dragon's head.
"Mr. Zig," said Scarlett.
"Aye, captain," said Zig, saluting dutifully. The pirate sprang up the door acrobatically and perched himself on the golden chains, situating himself directly on top of the golden lock. With a flick of his wrist, the same lock pick he had used only days before to save Zelda from her shackles came springing forth. He jammed it into the keyhole and began to work it back and forth methodically, his brow furrowed in deep concentration.
"Well, Princess, this is it: our moment of truth. I do believe this sort of lock upon this sort of door is in keeping with the traditions of the Seven Sages, so there is no doubt in my mind that we shall find our treasure in the room beyond," said Scarlett, "Are you afraid? It's okay, anybody would be."
The Captain came close to Zelda, her blood-red eye only inches from Zelda's face. The Princess returned her fearsome gaze with refined and melancholy silence.
"For the record, Princess, I do not want to kill you. There are some among my clan who hold a grudge with your family for our exile, but to me that is mere fable and legend. I could care less," said Scarlett, "There are other things I care about and it just so happens that this is the only way that I can protect those things. So I'm sorry about what has to be done. I wish there was another way, but I do not have a choice. It's nothing personal."
"You're going to kill me, and it's nothing personal?" said Zelda, calmly, "Oh, its personal Scarlett. Whether or not you want it to be, it is. Now let's get this over with."
Zig unlocked the door with a sharp click, and the golden chains began to withdraw into themselves like magic. Eventually, the lock itself came clattering to the floor, and the enormous double doors came swinging open of their own accord.
Inside was a round chamber with a domed ceiling, its floor a courtyard of short, lush grass of deepest green. A deku tree the size of a building dominated the center of the space, a small stone alter at its foot, etched all around with ancient runes carved in its surface. Scarlett went marching in immediately, and the pirates came after her, dragging Zelda along beside them.
"The Great Deku Tree!" cheered Scarlett, "The old legends said it would be here. It is said that this tree was the first living creature in all Hylia, older than the legend of the goddess itself. Long ago, it had a voice and a spirit, but the disrespect and defilement that people have for nature drove that spark out of it, and now it stands here a normal tree, a mere shadow of what it once was."
Scarlett approached the stone altar at the foot of the tree, and the pirates and Zelda gathered round her expectantly.
"To the one who bears the Chosen Blood of the Goddess," said Scarlett, her fingers tracing the ancient runes on the altar top, "The secret of the treasure shall be revealed to you, and what you dream of shall become a reality. Seems straightforward enough. Bring her here!"
Gwen seized Zelda's arm and began to drag her towards the altar, the Princess struggling hopelessly against the pirate's iron grip.
"Touch her hand to the stone," said Scarlett.
Gwen grasped Zelda's wrist and forced her palm down on the top of the altar. Zelda felt the cool stone under her fingers, but nothing happened.
"Alright then," said Scarlett, producing a dagger from her belt, "This will hurt a bit, Princess."
Zelda was struggling and pleading with them, but the pirates held her firm in place. The Princess whimpered in pain as the pirate dragged the curved edge of her knife across the back of the girl's hand, cleaving the skin with razor sharpness. Blood flowed in little crimson trickles over the back of her hand, slipping down the sides of her palm and in between the cracks of her fingers, the liquid breath of life pooling on the cool stone and running into the grooves of the carven runes.
There was a rumbling, and the altar began to shift, sliding off its pedestal as cleanly as can be.
"Looks like it's your lucky day, Princess!" cried Scarlett, wiping her dagger clean and stowing it away in her belt once more. Zelda and the pirates all watched with keen anticipation as the shifting altar slid away, revealing a recessed compartment of stone in the ground below. Scarlett leaned in close. There was a depression in the stone the shape of some jagged object that the pirate could not name, because, whatever it had been, it was not there.
"Damn!" shouted Scarlett, "Damn, damn, damn, damn, damn!"
The pirate tore her hat off her head, threw it to the dirt and kicked it angrily.
"Where the hell is it? It has to be here!" she shouted. Then, she rounded on Zelda, and there was a kind of mania about the look in her one red eye that Zelda had never seen before. Scarlett was always unpredictable and a little scary, but with that look on her face she was downright terrifying. She looked like a woman at the end of her rope, driven to actions of desperation more deplorable than the Princess could have imagined. "Drain her dry," sneered the mad pirate.
Gwendolin drew her sword swiftly, and pointed it at the Princess. Zelda screamed.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you."
All eyes were upon the newcomer. Nyarlath came up the steps and through the double doors, appearing like a rising titan, taller and more menacing than any of the pirates. His eyes were alight with eldritch magic, and the crystal clutched in the silver talon on his chest crackled inside with mystic lightning arcs.
"Demon!" cried Scarlett, the madness in her eyes still burning. She drew her own cutlass and pointed it at Nyarlath in an accusatory manner, "You show your vile face at last! I will make you pay for your crimes against the Shiekah."
"And defile one of your people's holiest of temples? The very symbol of the life you would avenge?" the Wizard sniggered evilly, "Life springs up all around us," said he, producing from his closed fist a single green seed the size of a large marble, which he laid out flat on his palm, "Growing from the humble beginning of a single seed into the myriad of squirming, breathing things that flutter all around us." He let the seedling fall from his palm, and where it hit the dirt it burrowed down of its own accord, and a sapling sprang forth at once as if time had kicked into overdrive.
"From the creeping ground, it reaches up to the heavenly sun, grasping for the energy to grow. So it develops, mind, heart and soul, becoming part of all of us, and we are led by the strings of fate, which speak to us from the shadow realm of dreams, guiding us ever onward towards infinity," said Nyarlath, watching as the little sapling began to shift and stretch, and soon was as tall as his knee.
"Life truly is the grandest of journeys, but no matter how we struggle, no matter how we rail against the adversity of the world around us, every one of life's great journeys ends in the same place: the inevitable demise of all things, our pitiful return to the very void which spat us out, our moments in the sun tiny and unremarkable in comparison to the finality of that last, desolate horizon which awaits us all," said Nyarlath. The plant was almost as tall as him now, and the end of its stalk began to swell, developing into a giant flower bud, large enough to hide a child in.
"Do you not understand?" said Nyarlath, his gaze now locked on Zelda's, and she knew the awful sorcerer was addressing her directly, "Our very lives are but waking dreams, meaningless trances we find ourselves in, where the illusion of purpose is maintained pointlessly and our every toil only serves to dig ourselves deeper into our graves."
The flower bud shivered and split at the seams, blooming suddenly into a blossom of crimson red, deep violet and shocking orange. The dekubaba had just been born, and clicked its razor teeth hungrily at the air, its 'head' bobbing about, sightless. Even as it blossomed it continued to grow, now larger than Nyarlath himself.
"I am Nyarlath, Lord of Dreams, and I will awaken all life from this perverse dream of reality, and bring about that final void of demise to which all things are destined to return! You fools cannot fight your own fate. I will awaken you to the reality of your own insignificance, and you will feel the bliss that only death can bring!"
At the Wizard's words, the giant dekubaba came lunging forward, snapping viciously at them. Gwen hit Zelda like a bullet, grabbing her around the waist and bringing her to the ground to avoid the massive, snapping jaws. Kef and Zig both cartwheeled away expertly, and Scarlett merely sidestepped the attack, taking the opportunity to bury her cutlass in the side of the massive creature. It screeched, thrashed its bulbous head, and struck the Captain with such force that she was knocked into the rough bark of the nearby deku tree.
"Captain!" cried Zig, rushing forward to put himself between the monstrous plant and his fallen Captain. The thing snapped at him, but the pirate dodged its assault and jabbed it four times with the point of his wrist blade before it could recover. The monster roared hideously. Zig braced himself as it lunged at him again, and though he was quick the monster was quicker this time. Zig threw up his sword arm to shield himself, and the massive jaws of the thing came chomping down, taking his arm all the way up to the shoulder. The plant flailed extraordinarily, and shook Zig like a rag doll.
"Zig!" shouted Gwen.
The plant whipped the unfortunate pirate around like a dog shaking a piece of meat. Eventually the force was simply too much, and Zelda watched in horror as Zig's arm seemed to tear right from its socket. The pirate went flying to the ground with a thud, and did not rise. Zelda screamed.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Meanwhile, Link was emerging from the damp, mushroom-lit hallway into a room lined with the ruins of standing pillars, and he could hear a commotion up ahead which caused him to burst into a run. Clearing the huge stone hall, he went leaping up the stoop and towards the double doors. He gasped in shock at the scene before him. The Wizard Nyarlath was there, and some kind of giant mutant dekubaba was thrashing violently at Zelda and the pirates!
"Zelda, no!" cried Link, dashing into the fray. He leapt over the wriggling vines which were sprouting like awful parodies of feet from the base of the monster's stem, and made his way to Zelda and Gwen with acrobatic quickness.
"Little green bug?" said Gwen, unable to believe her eyes, "How did you get here?"
"Don't worry about that!" shouted Link, "Just give Zelda to me, I'll get her out of the way!"
Gwen stared at Link for a moment. A searching vine went whipping at the pirate, grasping her arm. Yelping with surprise, Gwen hacked at the thing with her cutlass which she still held in her other hand. It came loose in two swings.
"Fine," said Gwen, allowing Link to take Zelda's hand, "But don't go too far."
Link took Zelda's hand and led her across the treacherous battlefield, ducking creeping vines and razor teeth, and scrambling over the ever-expanding system of roots which writhed around the floor like a carpet of squiggling earthworms.
"Link!" cried Zelda, "I cannot believe it! How did you get away from the pirates?"
"It's a long story," Said Link, leading the princess out of the chamber and into the hallway with the ruined pillars, "But right now I need you to trust me. I have to stop Nyarlath before he gets his hands on the treasure of this temple. It's going to look like I'm asleep, but just trust me ok? This is the only way I can do this. And try not to let them kill me while I'm still unconscious, ok?"
"Wait, Link, I do not understand," said the Princess, "What do you mean asleep? Unconscious? I do not know what you are talking about!"
"Look, I know it doesn't make sense, but you have to just trust me," said Link, clasping the princess' hands in his and looking her in the eye. Zelda's ocean blue orbs shimmered back at him, tears threatening to spill out from the corners, but the princess smiled faintly at him and nodded her head.
"Ok, Link, I trust you."
"Good."
Link took the Sleepstone from his pocket, and held it up in front of his face just as he had in the brig on the Crimson Stalfos. "Slumber," he whispered.
There came the kaleidoscopic shift of perspective Link had come to associate with the Dreamworld. The Temple of Life shifted all around him, and he watched as the fallen pillars rebuilt themselves, and gorgeous potted plants of myriad colors sprang up like caps upon their tops, letting ropes of foliage which shined like silver down in long thin strands which draped the length of the pillars and coiled on the ground like sleeping snakes. There was no roof anymore, only a sunlit sky of brilliant blue, dotted with puffy rolling clouds of angelic white.
Nearby, the shadowy Waking World Zelda was shaking Link's sleeping self, urging him to return to her, and tears streaming down her cheeks. Link felt a little pang of guilt for putting her in such a spot, but he steeled himself against it, remembering that this had to be done for Zelda's sake and that of all Hyrule. Link's eyes narrowed in determination, and he was ready. Nyarlath had to be stopped!
He raised his fingers to his lips and gave a sharp whistle, "Here boy!"
As if from thin air, the clockwork dragon came careening from the sky, landing at Link's side with a thunderous boom. It shot sparks into the air in a declaration of readiness. Link mounted the thing, and together they went soaring into the room where the pirates were fighting the giant dekubaba in the Waking World.
In the Dreamworld the monster appeared sharper and more defined than most of the shadows cast by the Waking World. Link steered the clockwork dragon round the beast, scanning the room for Nyarlath. At last, he spotted the wizard near the stone altar, and he seemed to be searching for something. The treasure! Link urged the dragon forward. They dived towards Nyarlath like a swooping falcon on a field mouse.
"Insolent boy," said Nyarlath's voice in Link's ear. The old wizard turned, and in the Dreamworld link could see that his weathered face was not his own. A bull's skull with hollow, dead eyes beset with eldritch purple flames glared at him, its hideous grin motionless and without feeling. The wizard raised his hand and Link and the clockwork dragon were stopped mid-flight, hanging there in the air as if frozen in time. "I do not know where you gained the power to walk amongst the sleeping, but the Dreamworld is mine to do with as I see fit. You cannot hope to stop me here."
With a gesture of his hand, Nyarlath sent Link and his dragon flying into the giant dekubaba, which rounded on them spectacularly, its jaws chomping hungrily at the Dragon's beating wings. The clockwork dragon began showering the monster with steam and sparks which singed its shaking leaves, but the dekubaba remained relentless in its attack.
"No!" cried Link, gripping the dragon's shoulders tight so he wouldn't be shaken off, "You have to fight it!"
The vines of the plant began to rise, twisting around the dragon, creeping up to brush Link's arms and legs, and pulling them both closer and closer into the awful, snapping jaws.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In the Waking World, the pirates were taking the opportunity to regroup. Scarlett rose from the grass, marveling at the sight of Nyarlath floating in the air above her, and the giant dekubaba, apparently fighting some unnamed, invisible foe. Then her eye caught sight of Gwen and Kef, who were dragging the limp form of Zig away from the battle on their shoulders.
"Damn," said Scarlett, making a mad dash across the grass to join her crew.
"What happened to him?"
"Captain!" replied Gwen, "He's unconscious. The beast tore his clockwork arm clean off and smashed him pretty good on the ground, but I think he will be ok."
"Right," said the Captain, "Get him to the hall and hang back. Make sure that Zelda hasn't slipped away from us."
Then she turned back to regard the Dekubaba, which was still struggling enigmatically with some unseen attacker.
"What is it doing?" said Gwen.
"I don't know," said Scarlett, plainly, "But I intend to find out."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The vines were closing tight around Link and his dragon, and in moments they would be dragged into the waiting mouth of the giant dekubaba and eaten alive. Link roared defiantly at the beast, willing his dragon to fight back to the very last.
Then Link felt an electric sensation, like a wave of thought coming storming into his brain like striking lightning. "Okay now, you're not thinking with your whole brain! Try something bigger."
Link's eyes snapped open, and he suddenly knew exactly what to do. He concentrated as hard as he could on the dragon.
The vines, which had once cracked and tore at the brass and wood surface of the clockwork dragon's skin, now seemed to intertwine, seeping like trickles of water straight into it. The canvas of the wings seemed to molt away, peeling back like dried snake skin to reveal thick, tropical leaves. The brass caps on the top of the head came bursting apart, and horns of curled deku wood emerged, twisting into fawn-like spirals which flanked its head. All around him, the clockwork dragon was transforming, become something organic and full of the vibrant green of forest life. The mighty jaws of the dragon were flung open, and it belched a cloud of noxious, corrosive poison. The dekubaba shrieked and loosened its grip, its leaves and branches shriveling away to ash in every place the gas cloud touched.
Link's dragon beat its wings triumphantly, roaring at the clear, blue Dreamworld sky above. It had shaken off its clockwork aspect, and at Link's will become an avatar of nature itself, infused with the very spirit of the Temple of Life. As the dying dekubaba crumbled away to ashes, Link wheeled the dragon around, and the pair of them faced the Wizard Nyarlath with vengeance in their eyes.
"There is more to you than I thought, whelp," said Nyarlath. Then he sniggered again, that devilish, raspy laugh. "It matters not. When next we meet I shall be ready for you. You only prolong inevitability."
"You talk too much!" said Link, and the dragon opened its jaws again and belched another plume of noxious gas, but when the air was clear again Link could see that the Wizard had gone.
The dragon set down gently on the grass before the stone altar, and Link dismounted. He rushed over to the depression in the ground beneath the altar, and peered hopefully down. Sparkling in the sunlight, set perfectly in a carven socket on the stone, a jagged shard of shining metal was resting. Link reached down and picked the thing up, being careful not to cut himself on its sharp edges. He held the thing up to the light and it looked to him like a piece of the blade of a sword.
"Is this the treasure?" he wondered aloud. He shoved the thing into his pocket, and then turned to face his dragon. "You did a great job, boy!" said Link. The hybrid of wyrm and wood bowed its leafy head, and Link patted it approvingly.
Reaching into his pocket, Link withdrew the Sleepstone, and held it in front of his face to say the magic word…
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Is he asleep?" said Gwen as she approached Zelda and Link. Zelda looked up, tears still in her eyes, and shook her head with disbelief.
"I do not know what happened," said Zelda, "He just took me out here and told me to trust him and then he… and now he is… it is like he is cursed all over again!"
"What's going on up there, Captain?" shouted Kef. Scarlett was still at the top of the stairs, watching the giant dekubaba struggle pathetically against thin air. Its leaves were beginning to curl and shrivel, turning brown and wilting before her eye.
"It looks like its dying," replied Scarlett.
"Dying?" said Kef, "How could it be dying?"
"It doesn't matter," said Scarlett, "It seems as though Nyarlath is gone too. Bring Zelda back up here, we have to collect the treasure quickly and get out of here before the old warlock returns."
"Awaken!" shouted Link, sitting bolt upright, and causing Zelda to scream. Link looked at her, and his face broke out in a giant grin. He hugged the Princess tight.
"Zelda!" he cried, "You're safe! We did it! We really did it!"
"What is he babbling about?" said Gwen.
"Whatever you think happened, kid," said Scarlett, marching up to seize Zelda's hand and pull her to her feet, "It was just some stupid dream. You've been asleep this whole time."
"Yeah, I know," said Link, "I know, it was a dream, but it doesn't matter! I did it!"
"He's mad!" shouted Gwen.
"No, look," said Link, producing from his pocket the little shard of blade he had recovered from the Dreamworld, "Here: the treasure. This is it, I'm sure!"
"Let me see that!" shouted Scarlett, letting Zelda go and snatching the little shard from Link's fingertips. The pirate held it up to the light, and saw that there were runes marked upon its flat side, although with only the one piece there no words to be read. "Well I'll be drunk and robbed, this is the genuine article."
The pirates could only stare at the boy in slack-jawed wonder.
