New Home - BotW Link x Reader (Undergoing Revisions)

Chapter 49 - Something Strange, Something Wonderful

This was a stupid idea, really, it was.

Cresting a hill only with the intention of careening down it atop shields, ensuring our run back to camp was longer and more arduous than perhaps we anticipated, was stupid. Willingly clinging to Link as he crouched, summoning up a gust and aided by Revali, and getting fired off into the sky with only Link's paraglider to get us safely to the ground, was stupid. Going running, racing towards Hylia only knew where, with all my manner of navigation and place-finding left at camp, was stupid.

Oh, but I just couldn't help it.

Not when Link was smiling like that, and my heart was fluttering just this. I was never so sure of anything in my life than I was of this being simultaneously stupid but exactly where I wanted to be and what I wanted to be doing and who I wanted to be with.

I wanted to be with Link. Maybe forever. Though perhaps that wasn't even long enough.

I knew we'd have to hike back to camp eventually. With the slate strapped to Link's belt, he'd ensure we would be able to find our way back. We've spent several days like this, now. Since returning from the Gerudo Desert we'd settled into a comfortable, though new, kind of rhythm.

By dawn we awoke and had breakfast, and through the day we traveled, and for lunch we paused for respite. After that, we traveled a few hours more, until dinner - though often this started well before dinner too, or even as I was attempting to prepare it; Link would grab me by the hand and heft me to my feet and haul me after him even if I protested, even as I laughed, even as I said that well, maybe we should eat first.

It should be obvious that I only put up a fight for show. I never kept it up for long.

Depending on the area, sometimes we'd swim, sometimes we'd climb, sometimes we'd run, sometimes we'd do none of that and something else entirely; traipsing through the trees recklessly, chasing grasshoppers as they leapt through tall grass, exploring an abandoned set of ruins strife with glittering treasure and forgotten relics.

Sometimes we'd do any combination of them. It was all dependent, of course, on where we were. Any monsters we saw we fought, with only our most trusted weapons at our sides.

On this day in particular I only brought with me my spear and Link had a steel sword at his hip, and we carried our shields with us as well.

We traveled far from camp on this particular day, further than normal, and for a moment - only for a moment - I entertained the thought that we'd maybe need a temporary camp away from camp, so to speak, though I knew all too well that instead of swallowing his pride and doing that, that Link would carry me back to our original camp himself, each and every step of the way, if I was too exhausted to do so myself.

Revali's gale lifted us to the top of another hill and on light feet Link landed, and I let go of him once on solid ground and I ran forward a few paces, momentum guiding me there and leaving me the unwilling traveler. I wheeled around immediately, a grin on my face as I readied my shield, lifting it up as though he couldn't see it, and he was on the same page as me right away. In fact, he seemed to have been a step ahead.

Somehow not yet breathless, he jogged the few required paces to pass me and he leapt up, setting the shield beneath his feet in one fluid motion all before landing, and he took off. With less-practiced, though incredibly eager movements, I followed suit, crouching low to try to accelerate a little faster down the grassy hill.

It was a close race, to be sure. It provided me an almost sickening sense of satisfaction when Link would look over his shoulder and gradually saw me getting closer - meaning the cocky and self-assured smile on his face was gradually etched into something more worried, maybe even frantic as he tried to figure out a way to widen the gap.