chapter 18 Moonlit Truths

[First-person – Gerudo Palace, Moonlight Garden]

The desert night was colder than I expected.

Stars blanketed the sky overhead, but their light did little to ease the chill radiating between the two women seated across from me. Riju wore silks deep red like blood, her dagger resting at her side—ceremonial, but pointed. Zelda had changed into a simple sleeveless tunic and traveling cloak, the royal embellishments gone, but her presence was just as sharp.

And me?

I sat between them, pretending I wasn't shaking inside.

> I've faced monsters. I've battled corrupted spirits. But nothing… nothing prepares you for a jealous princess and a territorial queen discussing your heart like it's contested territory.

"Thank you both," I said, forcing calm. "For agreeing to this."

Riju crossed her legs. "I agreed so I could hear what she thinks she has a right to."

Zelda didn't rise to the bait. "I'm not here to argue. I came to understand why the man I waited for… ended up in someone else's bed."

Her words weren't angry. That made them worse.

---

[Flashback – First-person Memory]

I remembered Zelda's face the day I vanished into the Depths. How her hand clung to mine. The way her voice cracked: "Don't let go. Please, stay with me."

But I had let go.

Pulled into darkness. Reborn with too much power. Too much responsibility.

And when I came back… she was gone. Then Riju found me.

---

"I thought you were lost forever," I said. "When I woke up, I couldn't even feel your presence. The Tear—yours—it was quiet."

Zelda's eyes shimmered. "So you replaced me?"

"No!" I said too quickly. "It wasn't like that. Riju—she was there when I needed someone. When I didn't know who I was anymore."

"I helped you remember," Riju added, almost protectively. "I stood beside you when you cried over the visions. When you thought you were breaking apart."

Zelda blinked once. "And I rebuilt him once before. When no one else believed."

> Silence.

The garden was beautiful—flowers blooming in torchlight, a fountain whispering—but it felt like a battlefield.

"I didn't come here to hurt either of you," I whispered.

"But you did," Zelda said softly. "Without meaning to. That's what love does, sometimes."

---

[Zelda – Third Person, Brief]

Zelda looked at him, the man she loved—the man she still loved—with an ache deep enough to drown kingdoms.

She saw it in his eyes. He wasn't lying.

He loved both of them.

And she hated how human that made him.

Because she wanted him to be hers.

Only hers.

---

[First Person – OC]

"I don't want to choose between you," I said.

Riju looked away. Zelda stared right through me.

"You'll have to eventually," Zelda said.

"No," I said. "I don't. That's the curse this world keeps falling into. Tragedy by fate. Love divided by prophecy. I won't play that game."

The Tears on both women pulsed faintly.

Mine—the Tear of Balance—glowed like a heartbeat.

And something stirred.

Not in the palace.

Below.

Deep beneath the sands.

---

Zelda stood. "Then I'll wait."

Riju narrowed her eyes. "So will I."

Zelda walked over to me and placed her hand on my chest. "You belong with me. You know it. You just forgot."

Riju stood beside me and placed her hand on my shoulder. "No. He just remembered he belonged with us."

I didn't breathe.

And that's when the ground trembled.

---

[Transition – Hyrule, Third Person]

Far away, in a forgotten chasm hidden beneath the Gerudo Desert, an ancient door—sealed with seven forgotten glyphs—shuddered open.

Inside, something began to breathe for the first time in ten thousand years.

Its first word, cracked and hateful:

> "Balance... must be broken."