Over the course of the few days Okuin spent there, it was decided that pooling their knowledge would clear things up. He didn't even have to ask Gennish to come to Hyrule with him, the only approval they had to wait on belonged to Gendooru, her superior. As soon as she got it she was throwing scrolls together for the journey.

The Gerudo's proud, white steeds stood a few hands taller than Okuin's piebald, with thick shoulders and out-thrust chests. Gennish led hers out of the stable, still chatting animatedly with the Shiekah. "I've always wanted to come to Hyrule. I'd already put in a request to visit but Gendooru wanted some sort of responses first, something to show I was welcome, and here you are!"

Okuin smiled at her. This mystery was becoming more and more worth the effort it was taking to uncover.

The horse snorted at him, and he flinched back. "Whoa. Doesn't take to strangers, does he?"

"She does have trouble making friends," Gennish chuckled, pulling herself up. "Not like your dopey little thing. Trusts anyone who feeds it, does she?"

"She was bred for a different purpose. Speed, for instance," Okuin pointed out, unoffended.

That spurred a race. Once the two of them were fixed in their saddles, and Okuin had made sure the Gerudo's map was properly updated, they took off at a gallop. As Okuin suspected, the white horse soon fell behind, but as he breasted the green lands, his piebald began to falter, and he dismounted to lead her to the Zora River.

She dipped her head in gratefully. Trees had grown up along the banks, providing shelter from the sun and making the horse look more dappled than ever. Okuin washed his face after he'd refreshed his canteen, grateful to be heading home. The weather away from the desert agreed with his lungs much more.

There was a rustle behind him. Okuin kept still for a moment, hoping not to startle the creature, if it was indeed a creature, but the unmistakable brush of fabric against leaves jarred him to turn.

An eyeless mask stared at him. A tall stranger stood, wrapped tightly in a blue and gold cloak like a great perching bird, age and gender made unidentifiable beyond it. Okuin made no move. They did not appear to be armed, at least.

"The Sacred Realm is not the business of Nayru's children. We must keep away from it, or terrible things could be unleashed across Hyrule."

Okuin blinked, unsure for a second if the figure had truly spoken. They turned away from him. "H-hey, what…"

The cloak fell open, but nothing was visible beyond it as an arm shot toward him, pointing. "You must not continue meddling in the goddess's affairs. Others have tried and they all failed, but you? You would doom us." The mask fixed on him. The voice seemed barely affected by it, as though the speaker's face wasn't obscured at all.

Okuin was speechless. His eyes shot to his horse's saddlebags. When had the stranger rummaged through them? How else would they have known? He pulled a knife from its mounted sheath, but when he thrust the blade at the cloaked figure, there was no one there.

A bird broke into song, startling him, and he almost dropped the knife. The piebald grunted, lifting her head. He returned the weapon to its place and pulled himself back into the saddle, urging his mount along.

Gennish was alone when she reached the castle, but not for very long. A girl, some Sheikah sentry with spiked hair, had been keeping an eye out for riders. She escorted the Gerudo across the drawbridge.

"You've met my uncle, then," the sentry deduced first thing, simply from the heap of documents poking out of the saddlebags.

"Okuin? Yes. We were racing, so I expect he'll be along soon," Gennish told her. They exchanged introductions.

Nokune's fingers had already curled around the white horse's hanging reins. "I'm legally required to sign you in, so you'll have to come with me, all right? I'm employed as a guard so no one else will bother us. I'll take you to the library after, that's where Okuin will be waiting."

This seemed to be the proper protocol, so the Gerudo allowed herself to be led along, dismounting in the cobbled street. Nokune's age was hard to make out, but she seemed to be around sixteen, short and sociable, perhaps a bit too carefree to be a proper soldier. She had bronze skin, lighter than Gennish's but darker than any Hylian, and her hair was a shock of white that ended in a tiny ponytail at the base of her neck.

"I sort of see the resemblance," Gennish noted aloud as she retrieved her saddlebags.

"Hm? Yeah." Nokune ran a hand over her pointed ears. "My dad always said we had the same nose. We used to play together when we were little."

"Isn't he much older than you?"

Nokune grinned sheepishly. "Maybe he was more babysitting than what I remember. But he was good at playing along. We used to swordfight with sticks."

Gennish smiled. "To train you up?"

"I did that on my own." Nokune pushed open a door. The room was built into Hyrule castle's wall and a staircase led up to the battlements, but armored Hylian guards barred their way. The gatekeeper leaned back on a chair, his feet up on his desk. Sleeves of paper spilled over one side with the sudden draft from the outside, dislodging the man with a start as he caught them. Nokune walked over to him while Gennish waited in the hollow of the closed door.

Another man stood by the Hylian guards. He was not armored like them, though he carried a sheathed sword with him, but instead wore a leather vest over a green tunic. Gennish did not see him until he tipped his head in acknowledgment of her. He blended into the worn stone, his blond hair partially covered by a matching green cap.

"It's good to see a Gerudo in the city again," he said by way of greeting.

Nokune gestured her over to the desk, indicating him as she passed. "Ah, this is Link, one of our specially trained knights. Link, this is Gennish, a new friend of my uncle's. I think she'll be spending quite some time here, judging by what she brought."

"Afraid so." Gennish grinned.

"Pleasure to meet you," Link said. "Nokune, keep her out of trouble."

"If she's anything like Okuin, trouble will be hard to come by," Nokune said drily.

"I mean…" Link bit the inside of his lip, trying to find the word. "Don't let anyone make trouble for her."

Gennish's smile faded.

"…Ah." Nokune's head dropped and her shoulders stiffened. Then she pulled Gennish forward to sign her in.

The sun was setting in crimson violet when they emerged. Gennish felt like a secret, still clutching her heavy saddlebags close as Nokune pulled her along the cobbled streets. Helmets rotated to follow them as they passed, but no guards moved to stop the Sheikah or her companion.

"I suppose it's our fault," Gennish said quietly to Nokune as she was pulled inside the library. "Aside from Gendooru, we've effectively cut ourselves off from Hyrule. The last time a Gerudo came here…"

Nokune nodded. She seemed relieved once they were safely inside the building, cramped as it was.

A small crowd awaited them.

Gennish instinctively felt for her concealed knife as she was advanced upon, but a hand was extended in greeting instead of a weapon.

"Welcome to Hyrule."

Okuin pushed through from behind four people to smile at her. "You made it! And you met my niece. Fantastic. Everyone, meet Gennish, the Gerudo librarian."

That was enough for one of them, a Hylian woman with a pinched face. "She doesn't look like much of a librarian to me." She was lighting glass-protected lamps with a high torch, and she didn't let the introduction interrupt her work.

"No, Aska, but she is certainly more distributive of her knowledge than you are, and that's what libraries are supposed to be, last time I checked."

Aska sniffed at Okuin's remark and walked away. The sage hurried to fill in her emptied space between the shelves, throwing his arms around two Sheikah men. "This is Toa and Teru. They're interested in what we're doing so I thought I might show them a little of what we've found, if that's all right. The more the merrier."

The brothers, for they clearly were brothers, gave toothy smiles.

The last remaining stranger, an old woman, harrumphed for attention.

Okuin glanced at her. "This is Iziz. She will not be merry. Or joining us."

"I'm just here to make sure my apprentice is not getting himself into any trouble," the woman said, giving Gennish a brief once-over before excusing herself to follow in Aska's wake.

"I knew she'd love you if she met you," Okuin said with the same dry humor his niece had exhibited.

"What's all that about? Iziz is usually so friendly," Nokune said, frowning.

"I don't know. I think it all makes her nervous. She reacted badly when I showed her the little trinket you and I made." He fished in a haversack he hadn't had with him in the desert, and Gennish moved eagerly forward to see what she'd been waiting for.

"Trinket?" The other Sheikahs parroted.

It was a little gray cuff, almost like a shackle. Carved into it were not letters, but not quite identifiable shapes. Scales of a snake, curling in a tight wheel. Half of what may have been an eye. It didn't feel as thought someone had designed this pattern. The shapes had called to each other to create this object.

Tel and Toa leaned over her as Okuin dropped it in her waiting hands. It was surprisingly light for feeling like it was made of stone.

"It's hard to see," Toa said.

"Here." Okuin snapped his finger, and on the tip of it, a purple flame ignited. The light danced across the cuff. "Better?"

"How did you make this?" Tel inquired.

"I translated a spell using a cypher from the Book of Mudora, and when I read it out, this was in my hair." Okuin held up his hair, which was back to its loose ponytail.

"So it's old magic," Toa devised. He opened one hand hopefully and Gennish relinquished the cuff to him. He gave her an excited smile.

"It's something the sages abandoned, or never learned in the first place. This spell may have been written by…" Okuin paused, and gestured for them to follow him into his study. The basement did not echo like the closed, empty library did. "It may have been originally written by the king of the Gerudo."

All eyes shot to Okuin. Nokune started, her hand clenching as though for want of a weapon. "Ganondorf?!"

"May have. We don't know for sure."

Gennish clarified. "The scrolls are from before the Hero's time, about when Ganondorf was trying to obtain access to the Sacred Realm. It's unclear whether this is supposed to summon a door or a key to open the door, or even whether or not it was ever finished."

"I know you're just trying to make it sound exciting to get us to help dig through dusty parchment for hours and possibly days," Tel said disapprovingly, "but it's working and I'm definitely in." He ended the sentence with another toothy grin.

"The Sacred Realm," Toa breathed. "What would it mean to open a window to the gods? To have them speak directly to the king? We could have a whole new kind of sage serving Hyrule."

"That was my thought!" Okuin said excitedly. "Well, among others. Imagine the possibilities!"

Nokune spoke up. "I don't like it, uncle. If the king of evil wrote these spells, I don't want anything to do with them."

Okuin blinked, his excitement fading. The light on his finger flickered. "All right, then," he said. "Suit yourself."

"I bet I have friends who would be interested in this," Toa suggested. "If we need more manpower to go through the library, I could ask them."

"Plenty of Gerudo would follow me to Hyrule if I asked," Gennish added.

Okuin folded his hands, the violet light shifting over his knuckles. "We have to be careful with whom we share this. The concept of a world beyond our own scares some people."

"Not to mention…" Toa tugged the collar of his tunic.

"Ganondorf," Okuin agreed. "He disappeared years ago while working on this spell. We'll have to take precautions. It may well be that he succeeded. That Ganondorf is in the Sacred Realm."