Common Jollin
TiMESoNG
Nabooru wasn't always a woman with a need to help save the kingdom. She started off as warrior with little more on her plate than guiding and guarding her people. Life in the Desert wasn't easy. Her people, the Gerudo, were dependent on trade to get by--they traded away their fine textiles and glasswork for the food their arid home could not provide for them. What trade could not provide, they stole from other races.
She wanted to stop him, or at least slow him down. She could understand being forceful and conniving to get what one needed--that was what their race taught their children, after all--but Ganondorf's methods appalled her. She could scarcely believe that her sisters trusted him the way they did. Were they all so blind? Gerudo law said that their King was to be worshiped like a god, but how could they follow the flag of a god so brutal and underhanded?
She had to stop him. She went to his base of operations, at the end of the Haunted Wasteland, only to be thwarted at the last possible minute. She couldn't get into the Temple. The entrance large enough for her to pass through was blocked by a heavy slab of stone, and the only other way through was a tiny crevice that was far too small for even her slender frame to pass through. All of her efforts were in vain.
Until that kid with the fairy showed up, anyway.
The kid who'd turned up was just the right size to slither through the passageway. Nabooru questioned him, and he responded evasively that he wasn't looking for anything. The Gerudo thief smirked. Perfect timing! When she asked him to fetch the Silver Gauntlets for her, he had agreed to the task.
What were her plans for his reward? Nothing in particular really. Ordinarily, she wouldn't think a random kid would be able to pull this off, but there was something peculiar about him. Something she found she could trust and believe in. As she watched the boy get down and start to crawl through the tunnel, she contemplated what she might do for him. He was far too young to be a decent lover. He didn't seem like he would want money or other riches in return, though she'd probably give him a share of the treasure she found deeper inside the Temple. But was that really a reward fitting such a deed?
She needed to think. She left the Spirit Temple and headed back out into the hot, sun-soaked world of the Desert Colossus. Did the boy have any sort of family? A mother to worry about him when he didn't come home for dinner? A sister to stand up for him and ensure he was always safe? If the fairy bobbing around his shoulders was any indication, the answer was almost certainly "no." She knew the legends of the Forest Children. Their only guardian was an immobile tree. The boy had no family.
But perhaps among the Gerudo, he could.
Nabooru was barren, a strange thing for a Gerudo woman. She could have no children of her own blood. But here was a boy who had no family, no mother. Could she be his mother, take him in? Perhaps that could be his reward: a family to love him.
She stood there as day turned into evening, and as the sun began to set, she heard a triumphant shout from above. She recognized the voice. It was the fairy kid, Link. He'd found the Silver Gauntlets? But where was he? Twisting and squinting, she saw a smudge of green perched atop one of the stone-carved hands of the Goddess of the Sand, whose image adorned the front of the Spirit Temple. She was just about to call up to congratulate him when something caught her eye.
A dark portal opened up on the sands at her feet. Koume and Kotake giggled shrilly as they circled her like vultures. Nabooru felt herself being sucked down into the sands, and no matter how hard she struggled against the pull of the vortex, it continued to drag her down. Finally, she could fight no more. It pained her to have to give in, but even a stubborn woman like her knew when there was nothing more to be done.
What had happened after that? Frankly, Nabooru herself didn't know. So much of it was blurred to her memories, and that which was clear to her were things that she really wished had stayed hazy. Most of the things she could remember had a hazy quality to them, like a dream from long ago being called to mind.
Then suddenly, she knew where she was. Seated, draped in armor that was brutally hot and heavy. That simple order was her call to action. She had risen from her chair and moved to attack. Well... sort of, anyway. She'd neglected to take up her ax before doing so, and while the intruder stood there snickering, she had called it to her hand with a simple snap of her gloved fingers and menaced him with it. Slow, clanking steps brought her closer and closer to the target her mistresses had commanded her to destroy: The boy, and that annoying fairy fluttering around his shoulders.
He was fast. She could sling her ax as much as she wanted, but he was always a step ahead of her. He was always able to dodge, and retaliate with his blade. Piece by piece, he dismantled her protective gear, until finally, the straps holding the most weight fell away. And as her armor clanged deafeningly to the floor, she felt as if some heavy hand pressing down on her was lifted. Like the dream had ended. She fell to her hands and knees at the boy's feet, looking up at his startled face.
Where was she? And more importantly, how had that kid with the fairy grown into such a fine young man?
Suddenly, Nabooru remembered everything. She knew where she was. But more importantly, she knew where she had been, what she had done... and it sickened her. The two witches who had forced her into seven years of servitude for the man she hated above all else hovered on either side of her. When they spoke of again forcing her to work for their son and master, the Gerudo thief panicked. She shoved herself to her feet and tried to run, but the twin sorceresses were faster. In a flash of blue and red, they had her again.
She didn't know how long she stayed in that strange mental prison they had placed her in. At some point, though, she became aware of a strange sense of... fulfillment. Like the puzzle piece she had been missing was suddenly pressed into place by a mysterious stranger who had held it all along. And Nabooru knew. Suddenly, she knew. She knew who she was, and what she was meant to do. She knew that Twinrova could no longer hold her down. And so she left.
She left, and headed to a place just beyond the grasp of mere mortals. The Hero of Time was waiting for her.
Competent indeed. The blond warrior standing in front of her was doubtlessly the child she had seen in the Spirit Temple seven years before. There was no telling just what he had done over those years, but Nabooru was willing to bet he'd done something to make himself so skilled. He had saved her, and more than that, he'd essentially saved the Gerudo. With Twinrova gone, the desert women would be free from their corruptive influence, and the mindless violence that Ganondorf had placed in their hearts would disappear.
That was what she was. She knew now. Her role in the land's fate. Her destiny. Her reason for being. Perhaps she could not handle Ganondorf personally, but she could have a hand in his destruction. Along with the other Sages that the diligent Hero standing before her had called to their duties, she, Nabooru of the Gerudo, could put an end to his reign.
Nabooru.
The Queen of the Desert.
The lone wolf thief.
The Sage of Spirit.
....Had a hell of a ring to it.
NEWYORK
Proat
failia
