Fourth chapter of "From Shadows to Light" Aqua was just cured of her somniphobia and is now well-rested. As promised from the last chapter of "From Shadows to Light" we will put destiny in motion.

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Couple 13 - Chapter 4
From Shadows to Light
LinkxAqua

"You are the freedom he longs for."

These words kept plaguing Aqua's mind as she and Link crossed the rope bridge that the other group discovered before crossing. The bridge itself wasn't it prime condition as it deterred from rain and other conditions. As such, Epona refused to cross the gorge and the two were forced to enter the forest without her. Having slept for quite a while; two whole days according to Link, Aqua felt more refreshed than she ever was. Of course, this wasn't considering that she still needs to figure out what to do once they get back to the castle. Likely, they would already see through her disguise. But if she learned anything about Link, is that he always has a trick or two up his sleeve.

As they finished crossing the bridge, Link slowed down to observe the area. "Such a nice place." He remarked as he observed the wildlife moving about.

Aqua remained behind in silence, listening in to the birds chirping and wind blowing. "Such a sound. I've been in the darkness for so long that I've forgotten how they sounded like." She mentioned her time in the darkness.

Link crossed his arms, "Even though I'm given the opportunity to travel, I'm cooped up in the castle for so long that I feel I can't enjoy the serenity of the wild." He replied, closing his eyes in deep thought.

"Surly having food to eat and company within the castle can't be that bad." Aqua indicated, leaning forward into his view.

Link opened his eyes with a sigh, "I suppose I should be thankful for that luxury." He muttered and continued walking ahead.

Aqua kept quiet as she studied the surroundings. Truly she has appreciated the fact that she can experience these once more, but if the one-eyed wolf told her anything, it's that her escape is only temporary and that once their task is complete, she'll fall in darkness again. Thinking further on it, maybe this is the reason why she can't access her Keyglider and armor so that she can't cheat her way out. But perhaps she is thinking too much on it. Either way, she's stuck on this new adventure with Link. Even then, if this was a story, then who would be the protagonist?

Link suddenly stopped, signaling Aqua with a raise of his hand. Aqua in turn, steadied herself in ready of combat if needed. Link then gripped his sword, crouching to a nearby tree where Aqua followed suit.

As they hid behind a tree, they heard electricity surging and crackling. They slowly peaked from their hiding spot to see the elusive creature describe in Rusl and Auru's notes. As Link figured, it had the structure of a horse. Its body was white as snow with blue stripes at various sections of its body. Its tail and mane were white and flowed elegantly in the wind. Its eyes were a deep crimson which shown prominently upon its ethereal appearance. But the two things that he can point out if that it had a twisted horn on its head and its shadow was unlike any others, casting a white shadow as opposed to everyone else's dark shadow.

It stopped and looked around, observing its surroundings as if it felt like it was being watched. Snorting, it turned around and walked away. Link slowly got up to surprise it with Aqua following behind, but before they could get into full view, thunder crashed, causing a flash which forced them to cover their eyes with their arm. When it subsided, and they looked ahead, they saw that this creature was gone.

"Where did it go?" Aqua asked, checking left and right for the horse.

Link kept quiet and still had his hand on his sword. His ear suddenly twitched, causing him to look behind them where the creature stood a fair distance away. "There it is." He pointed out, drawing his sword.

Aqua summoned her keyblade, turning around to face the creature who studied them. "It doesn't look malicious." She noted, seeing that the creature didn't attack them immediately.

Link felt that way as well, noting that they were probably just intruding on its territory. "Maybe if we back away slowly, we can proceed without harming it or getting harmed by it." He proclaimed, slowly backing away.

As they were backing away however, something or rather someone decided to make a lot of noise.

"I'm just saying Ashei, Auru and Rusl probably just left us. It felt like it has been weeks since we last saw them." A young voice called out with a lot of trampling as they stepped on branches and twigs.

"First, we lose our horses, now we lost our friends." Another voice; Ashei, muttered, "I swear one of these days you're going to get us killed." She added with a notable disdain.

Link looked back, "Shad?" He called out.

Shad looked at him, "Oh! Old boy, you came!" He called out.

Unfortunately, with the addition of two new arrivals, the creature felt like its territory has been violated, so it decided to get rid of these trespassers, crying out a horrifying snort as electricity started to crackle again.

"Run." Aqua commanded, turning around in a sprint.

Immediately without word, Link complied, sheathing his sword and running towards Ashei and Shad whom the former forced the latter around and pushing him, forcing him into a sprint.

The creature jerked its head forward, causing lightning to crash down in front of it in a line. Galloping forward, it chased after the four trespassers with all intent of making them leave.

As the group continued to run, hoping to lose the creature, Aqua got an idea, stopping in her tracks and summoning her keyblade. Link looked at her, wondering what she was planning, "Hide." Was all Aqua said, before conjuring up an ice shard in front of her. The creature continued to gallop towards her, showing no signs of slowing down. Then Aqua swung her keyblade, enchanting it with fire and she held it above her. Gripping it with both hands, she swung her blade down on the ice shard just as the creature was about to trample her.

As soon as her blade struck the ice, frost enveloped the area, making it difficult to see. The creature soon stopped, looking around and noticing that the trespassers were no where to be seen. The smokescreen effect didn't last too long as it began to subside, but those few seconds were enough to lose sight of them. Snorting as it continued to look around, thunder crashed onto the ground and again, the area flashed with the creature vanishing without a trace.

As soon as the creature disappeared, Link peeked from behind a rock and deemed it safe for now. "If we don't want to meet up with it again, I suggest we leave." He suggested, standing aside to let everyone else out.

As the group headed back towards the bridge, Link looked back at Shad and Ashei, "So, Rusl and Auru got injured and had to retreat leaving you two behind. Why didn't you head back as well when you had the chance?" He asked as he was curious on why the two were still here. If anything, they could've met them on the way back if they weren't injured or anything.

Shad just perked his ears up, "You mean they left us?" He asked, mildly surprised.

Ashei just looked down with a deep groan, "So all that wandering, trying to look for them, it turns out they left a couple of days ago." She muttered beneath her breath, "I knew they went back without us." She exclaimed, slapping Shad at the back of the head. (Read: Dope slap.)

"You mean you guys separated into two groups?" Link asked, noticing that compared to the other two, these two were remarkably fine and uninjured.

"We didn't mean to, yeah?" Ashei pointed out, placing her hand on her hip, "But Mr. Loudmouth here discovered a rock and wanted to examine it closely." She pointed towards Shad.

"But it's a curious shaped rock. It's shaped like a star." Shad pointed out, grabbing the rock from his pouch and showing it to Link.

Link grabbed it, looking at the strangely shaped rock.

"I'm pretty sure that whatever that thing was likes to carve these things in its spare time. Yeah?" Ashei pointed out the reason behind the rocks shape.

As the two continued to argue in the background, Link showed it to Aqua who grabbed it and smiled at its shape, "Star-shaped fruit…" She muttered below her breath.

Link twitched his ears, "Star-shaped fruit?" He asked, making sure what he heard of.

Aqua looked at him, "Oh, it's just a little fun thing me and my friends like to muse about." She explained, reaching into her pouch and grabbing her wayfinder charm she surprisingly still had and showed it to Link, who grabbed it and held it in front of him to observe it. "Somewhere out there lies an island with star-shaped fruit and should two friends share it, then they'll be intertwined into each other's destinies and never grow apart." She explained the purpose of the fruit, "At least, that's how the legend goes." She mentioned it being a legend.

"Huh, fascinating." Link mused, handing back the charm. "I've been in many journeys, but I've never seen a star-shaped fruit." He pointed out.

Aqua still had a little smirk, "Maybe it's further out there." She replied, looking at the skies where the stars started to shine, remembering that one island she found before she fell into the darkness.

"Now that we assessed our situation, what about yours?" Ashei interrupted the monologue between the two.

The two looked at them clueless, "Huh?" Link called out.

"Who's the nice young woman you have there with you?" Shad asked, holding his hand out towards Aqua.

Link looked at her, "Just a woman I met before I came out here to retrieve you two." He explained quickly. He looked at her again, "Her name's Aqua." He introduced her.

"Well met Aqua. My name's Shad and this grumpy knight here is Ashei. We're members of a reconnaissance group." Shad introduced both himself and Ashei.

Ashei had her arms crossed, "You're not telling us everything, yeah?" She pointed out, noticing the tension between the two.

Link looked at her again, "Alright, here's a long story short." He decided to explain her presence here, "I found her, unconscious and in distress at the old structure you guys found last time. Not wanting to just leave her there, I took her back to the castle to get immediate care." He explained everything in a dekunutshell.

"Bet the council didn't like that." Shad muttered, crossing his arms as well.

Link looked out, holding his finger up, "They wouldn't have. If me and Queen Zelda didn't scheme to disguise her as Nayru; a Goddess in human form." He revealed the last bit.

Shad and Ashei looked at each other, "Queen Zelda was always the mischievous one." Shad muttered.

"And it doesn't take much to fool the council." Ashei finished his dialogue. "So, I'm guessing you three are still holding up this charade back at the castle?" She asked, looking at the two.

"Yes. So, if you two can play along, it would be great." Link answered.

The four now went quiet as they went back on the bridge. Aqua still held onto her wayfinder charm and Link was still fascinated by the rock Shad found; who wanted it back, and Ashei had her arms crossed with a sigh, seeing that the two men were fascinated with the rock.

When they were halfway across the bridge, they heard the familiar horrifying neigh of the creature who found them. "Uh oh." Shad muttered, looking back to see the stallion still looking at them menacingly, brushing its hoof against the ground with electricity surging through its body.

Link grabbed his bow out, "Get to the other side." He commanded to Shad and Ashei who ran pass them. Link placed an arrow onto his bow and aimed at the horn of the stallion before firing the arrow at it. While it didn't knock the beast away, it did stagger a bit and now it swung its head around, causing electricity to surge in front of it.

Aqua summoned her keyblade and conjured up two ice shards, before sending it flying at the creature, encasing its hooves in ice, stopping its attack.

Seeing the chance to flee, the two started to run across the bridge where Shad and Ashei already made it across and were now waiting for the other two. Their chance was short however, because the stallion managed to break free of the ice and continued its attack, summoning an electric field in front of it before slamming down its horn, causing the field to explode which broke the bridge, removing access to its territory.

They gasped as they felt the bridge beneath them and they immediately grabbed onto planks of wood as they swung across the chasm. As they slammed against the side of the cliff with a groan of pain, the plank of wood Aqua held onto cracked beneath her weight and she fell past Link, who immediately grabbed her hand, saving her from falling into the chasm. However, before the two could breath, Link's plank of wood snapped off the bridge, causing the two to plummet into the chasm, yelling along the way.

However, as they continued to fall, the strange rock Shad and Link had a fascination in started to glow, removing its guise as a simple rock. It shattered, and its dust covered the two as they plummeted deep into the chasm. At the bottom was a body of water, which at their speed and height, would still be deadly, but the dust softened the blow as they landed in the water, but instead of surfacing, they continued to fall into the darkness as if they were being transported somewhere.

But where?

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Ha! I finally managed to finish the chapter. Sorry for not writing for a long time, but my old laptop started to break, with many of the keys refusing to function properly. Luckily, I got a new laptop for Christmas, so it's all good. (Don't let this be an excuse though.)

Anyways, as promised, destiny has been put into motion and our heroes are embarking on a new adventure, but where will this take them? Find out next year! I'm kidding. Hopefully next chapter won't take as long. Sorry if this chapter is short.

Kirin: An elusive creature categorized as an Elder Dragon. It possesses the ability to harness the element of Lightning and can move at the speed of sound. It is believed its horn is the source of its ability.

Elder Dragon: Before you read again of my description of Kirin and wonder why it's called an Elder Dragon, read this. In the world of Monster Hunter, the term Elder Dragons is used as a category rather than a means to call a monster. It is often used to describe a monster that can have a huge impact on the environment and ecosystem wherever they appear. But here's a fun fact about Kirin. While it has a structure of a horse, it does possess scales akin to a dragon, so perhaps it is draconian in nature.

Hope you liked it! Please review.