By Goddess Rinoa/Miss Lydia Chapter 6

"Oww.....my back really hurts. I’m no good at sleeping on the floor."

"You’re such a city girl. I told you to sleep on the bed. You should listen to me next time."

"Quiet, you. No one asked for your opinion."

It was early in the morning. Lydia and Link were arguing already.

"You two just don’t know when to quit, do you?" Gordon broke in. "Anyway, do we go to Zora’s Domain now?"

"Yeah, I guess so," Link replied. "We have to go get that spiritual stone."

"Not so fast, you three," they heard a voice say.

Link turned around to see that Navi had appeared out of nowhere.

"Hey, Navi," Link said, "I thought we were supposed to meet you at the castle."

"Zelda sent me back here to catch you all before you go after that stone," Navi replied. "She wants the two sorcerers to train themselves first."

"Train?" Lydia asked. "How come? Don’t we have a battle of Good vs. Evil to fight?"

"It makes sense," Gordon said. "After all, we’re still new at this. We couldn’t do too well in a real battle unless we know what we’re doing."

Link glanced at Lydia and put his arms behind his head. "I’m starting to think that, even though he’s four years younger than you, Gordon’s the smarter and more logical one."

Lydia responded by throwing a weak lighting spell at Link’s feet, causing him to jump out of the way.

"Stop bickering!" Navi shouted.

".....Sorry." Link and Lydia replied.

"Hyrule’s in danger and you two do this? ....Anyway, Zelda wants to talk to you about that training. You three’ll have to visit the castle again."

Lydia grinned. "No problem. At least we don’t have to walk this time."

Lydia and Gordon grabbed hold of Link’s arms again and faced the castle to the north.

"Ray Wing!"

 

"I think Hyrule Field would be the best place to test your spells." Zelda said. "That’s the most empty and spacious area."

Lydia shrugged. "That sounds great, but I think I’d much rather test a spell or two on...say...Link’s house."

Link reached over and pulled a lock of her hair. She slugged his arm. Gordon shook his head, almost in shame or embarassment.

"Hey, Lyd," Gordon began, "how many spells can you cast? Personally, I think I only know ten or so spells."

Lydia stopped and thought. "Hmm...yeah...me, too, I just realized. The fireball is my strongest.  …..And coolest."

"Mine, too. Can we get by with only these that we know?"

"I dunno. I suppose we’ll have to get by."

"Ahem," Zelda cut in, "that’s another thing I wanted to talk to you two about. You’ll never guess what I found in the castle library yesterday."

"A dead frog?" Lydia sarcastically guessed.

Beside her, Link slapped his forehead with the ball of his hand.  “Have some respect, stupid!” he whispered harshly.

The princess rolled her eyes.  "Try again, Miss Lydia."

"I give up."

"I found a huge spellbook. It’s packed with spells from black, white, and shamanist magic."

"Wow, Zelda," Link said, "you sure do seem to find interesting stuff in your library. First the book with the Earth legend, transportation song included, and now a big spell book."

"Anyway," Zelda continued, "I think I should give the book to you two. You two can probably learn tons of spells from it."

"Whoa, Zelda, hold on," Link cut in again, "are you really considering giving something like that to that crazy girl?"

Lydia frowned at him.

"She’ll probably destroy all of Hyrule with some crazy spell," he added.

Lydia playfully shoved him aside and approached the princess. "A spellbook huh? That would be really, really useful to us, I think," she said. "Could you give it to us now, so we can get started?"

Zelda smiled. "Of course. Follow me to the library."

 

"Ooh! Gordon, look at this spell! The Damu Brass. I’ll bet that one packs a punch."

"But it says it’s used mainly to blow holes in walls and stuff."

"You never know when you need to blow away a wall."

Lydia and Gordon were sitting under a tree in a nearby village looking at the spellbook Zelda gave them. It was a very good spellbook, indeed. It listed the name of the spell, what it does, and everything a sorcerer needs to know to learn how to cast it. They could learn a lot of spells from this book.

It was almost too easy, they had thought earlier, but decided to just forget that detail.

Lydia looked up from the dusty, aged pages and glanced around this little town they were in. Link had called it Kakariko Village. It was very small, with cabin-houses scattered around. There was a big windmill on the east side.

"Say, where’d Link go?" Lydia asked.

"Don’t worry about him," Gordon replied. "He told us to take our time. He’s wandering around chatting with the villagers. Either that or he’s causing trouble somewhere. You never know."

Lydia shrugged and looked back in the book. After a minute or two she nudged Gordon and said "Hey, look at this one. The Dug Haut. Looks like a mean spell. Could you imaging getting speared by earth spikes like that?"

"Ouch."

By dusk, Gordon and Lydia had each learned dozens of spells from the book. Both of them could cast spells from all categories of magic, mostly shamanism and black magic.

Both of them still had their noses in the book when they heard a voice above them. "Are you guys done yet?"

They looked up. Link was sitting up on the tree’s limb. They had been so busy with the book that they hadn’t even realized he’d returned.

"Oh, hi," Lydia said with a smile. "We’re doin’ great here."

"Yeah!" Gordon said. "I’ve learned lots of new spells."

"In fact," Lydia continued, "I found a couple in here I want to teach you, Link."

"Me?" Link asked. "But I’m not a sorcerer."

"They’re simple spells. They’d help with your swordfighting."

"Well, I can always give it a shot."

Link jumped down from the tree and sat next to Lydia as she flipped the pages in the big book.

"Okay," Lydia said, "here’s one."

It took some doing, but Lydia thought she got Link to the point where he could cast both the Astral Vine and the Blade Haut. She wouldn’t be sure until tomorrow, though. It took a long time to teach Link the spells. It had gotten dark, so they’d have to wait until tomorrow to test their spells.

Gordon stretched out. "I’m beat. I can’t read anymore. Can we go back to the forest now?"

"Nope," Link said "we’re not going back there. My house isn’t a hotel."

"So.....just where are we gonna crash tonight?" Lydia asked.

"While you two were tinkering around with the hocus-pocus, I talked to a villager who was hanging around by the well. He owns that house right over there."

Link pointed at a house that was quite close to them, against a wall.

"The guy says he’s going away on a long trip," Link continued. "I told him our little story, and he says we can sleep at his place while he’s away. There’s enough beds for all three of us. After that epic bed-battle we had last night, I took that offer up. So we’re sleeping here in Kakariko."

Lydia smiled. "Great job, Link!" she shouted as she messed up his hair with her hand.

"Yeah, great!" Gordon said. "Now what we have beds, can we go to sleep?"

Link straightened his hair and said "Yeah, I’m tired myself."

He and Gordon got up and started toward the house. They stopped when they noticed Lydia wasn’t following. They looked back to see her still sitting under the tree, with her nose in the book and her eyes wide with interest.

"Hey, what’s up?" Gordon asked.

"Oh, my God," was her reply.

"What’s wrong?" Link asked as he and Gordon headed back to the tree.

"I just found a killer spell in here. Such a killer that it would probably be dangerous for both Gordon and I to even try to cast it."

Gordon plopped down next to her and glanced in the book. "Let’s see....the....Dragon Slave?"

Lydia read from the book. "The Dragon Slave – the most powerful attack spell in black magic."

"Why is it so dangerous for you to cast?" Link asked.

The boys patiently waited for Lydia to finish reading.

She looked up finally and said, "The Dragon Slave is a very high level spell and is extremely powerful. I’m sure Gordon and I are too young to even try this one."

"What can it do?" Gordon asked.

"Let’s just say it’s strong enough to level a city. It could probably destroy most of Hyrule Field in one shot.  That’s my guess."

"By Nayru! That is a killer spell." Link said.

Lydia glanced at Gordon. "We’d better not go for this one. This spell takes a LOT of magical energy to perform. Casting it would probably come close to killing us as this point. We’re just too young and weak, I’m guessing."

Gordon yawned. "That’s all well and good. We’ll talk about it in the morning. Can we get some sleep now?"

Lydia closed the book and followed the boys into the house nearby.

 

I can’t sleep, Lydia thought.

She was staring at the ceiling, thinking to herself. She figured that this would be a great time to think about a few things. It was very quiet. No distractions. What a great time for some serious thought.

She quickly changed her mind about that when she heard Link start snoring quietly in the other bed. Irritated, she threw one of her pillows in his direction and rolled over.

I wonder what that Dragon Slave spell is like, she thought. I know I’m probably too weak to perform it....but......

She sat up in bed and grabbed the spellbook of the bedside table. She turned toward the moonlight coming in through the window and flipped through the book until she came to the Dragon Slave.

"Just in case," she said to herself.

As she began to read the Dragon Slave spell, Link started snoring again. She rolled her eyes and threw her other pillow.

 

"I had the weirdest dream last night," Link said through a yawn. "I kept getting hit by things I couldn’t see, like invisible missiles or something. They just kept coming out of nowhere and hitting me."

Lydia thought of the pillows she threw at him every time he started snoring, but decided not to say anything.

Gordon was quite excited this morning. "What say we all head to the field and test our new spells?"

"Sounds good." Lydia replied. "We’ll need to try each one we read about last night. There’s no need to try them more than once each. We just need to see if we can pull them off."

Link glanced at her and said "Do you think you’ll be able to cast all those different spells?"

"Hmph," was her only reply.

"No really, you two read about so many. Do you think you can keep track of them all? It just seems like a whole lot of memorization to me."

"I’m sure I’ve got them all memorized. I’ve crammed for social studies tests which are usually pure memorization and have aced them. You’re the one I’m worried about."

"I only know two spells. An easy task really. I’ll bet you’ll forget a spell or two."

"No I won’t."

"Yes, you will."

"I’ll bet I won’t."

"You’re on."

The arguing continued as they left the village. Gordon was trailing behind, about ready to throw a spell on them to shut them up.

***

Lydia nudged Link forward a little. "Go on, give it a try."

"But," Link protested, "I’m not sure I can do it. I’m not a sorcerer."

"You remember the spell, don’t you?"

"Well, yeah, but –"

"Then try it."

"But –"

"Try it!!"

"Okay, okay!"

Gordon rolled his eyes as Link walked forward. They never quit, he thought.

The three had taken a place in the middle of the field to try their new spells. Lydia had volunteered Link to be first. He was several feet in front and had his sword drawn. He held it in front of him and muttered a spell under his breath. He then held it over his head toward the sky.

"Astral Vine!" he shouted.

Nothing happened. Lydia tilted her head in disbelief.

Link turned to look at her. "There. I tried it. Happy now?"

"Try it again," she replied.

Link shrugged and held his sword up again.

"Astral Vine!"

Again, nothing happened. Link got frustrated.

"Rats," he said, "What am I doing wrong? Let me see that spell again."

Lydia pulled the spellbook out of her bag and gave it to him. He opened it and flipped the pages.

After a minute or two, he said "Oohhhh....maybe that’s it. I messed up somewhere in the middle. Let me take another crack at it."

He gave the book back to Lydia and held up his sword again, determined to make it work this time.

He took a deep breath. "Astral VINE!"

This time a bolt of lighting struck the sword and made everyone jump. When Link brought his sword down it had a bright red coating on it.

Gordon smiled. "Great job!" he said. "What’s that spell do?"

Link walked up to a boulder and tapped it with the sword. He jumped back as the boulder split into two pieces.

"Whoa-aa!" Lydia shouted. "That was incredible!"

Link happily shot a thumbs-up. "Your turn!"

By the end of the day everybody had gotten skilled with their new spells. Even Link was casting his sword-enhancement spells with eaze. As for Lydia and Gordon, they were now able to cast dozens of spells very well. As the sun began to set, Navi reappeared and circled around the group.

"Oh, hi there," Gordon said.

"Zelda wanted to let you know that as soon as the sorcerers are ready," Navi said, "you all should head for Zora’s Domain again."

"So soon?" Lydia sighed. "But it’s getting late again. Can’t it wait until tomorrow?"

"It really shouldn’t," Navi replied.

"I really have to agree with Lydia this time," Link said. "We’re useless if we’re tired."

"I also agree," Gordon said. "We really should wait until tomorrow.  Besides, King Zora will just send us home again."

Lydia gave Navi one of those Hey-look-I’m-right-and-you’re-wrong looks.

"Oh, fine then. But you still shouldn’t.... Just be sure you’re up bright and early tomorrow!" Navi shouted as she flew off.

Lydia leaned over and whispered to Link. "Can I throw a Digger Volt at her?"

"Better not," he replied.

"Please? Pretty please?"

"No."

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