Princess Zelda: Triforce Heart by Jade Gretz

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Princess Zelda: Triforce Heart ANIMATION

The Lament Beneath Lake Hylia

The moon was a thin sickle over Lake Hylia, its light silvering the glassy surface until it looked as if the heavens themselves had spilled their tears upon Hyrule. The night was warm but not kind; the air trembled with the breath of something ancient that stirred beneath the waves.

Princess Zelda stood alone on the wooden dock, her reflection glimmering beside the moon’s. Her white gown fluttered around her ankles, whispering in the breeze. She had come without guards, without escort—drawn by a song.

It was not the kind sung by mortals. It hummed from the lake’s heart, a lullaby woven of longing and despair, so soft she might have thought it her imagination—had it not whispered her name.

“Zelda…”

Her fingers tightened around the hilt of the dagger she kept beneath her sash. The voice rose again, tender as a lover’s sigh.

“Zelda… come closer.”

Her heart quivered. The wind had stilled entirely now. No crickets, no frogs. Even the ripples of the lake seemed to freeze as if listening.

“Who speaks?” she called, her voice steady despite the cold dread slithering into her bones. “Show yourself!”

A long silence followed, broken only by the soft creak of wood beneath her feet. Then—

“I remember you,” came the voice from beneath the surface. Deep, resonant, almost human—and yet not. “The child who prayed at the water’s edge. The one who dreamed of peace.”

Zelda took a careful step back. “I prayed to the goddess,” she said. “Not to what sleeps below her reflection.”

A ripple shuddered across the lake, faint at first, then swelling into a slow and monstrous heave. The moon’s reflection shattered into trembling shards.

“You prayed,” the voice rumbled, “and I listened.”

The water erupted.

From the depths rose a creature vast and magnificent—a leviathan the color of twilight. Its body was long as a castle wall, scaled in plates that gleamed like drowned glass. Eyes like molten sapphire fixed upon her, and its mouth—lined with teeth curved like scythes—split into what might have been a smile.

Zelda stumbled back but held her ground. “By the goddesses…” she whispered. “You are real.”

“I am every fear cast into the water,” it said. “Every wish whispered to the waves. I am what the lake remembers.”

Zelda’s pulse thrummed in her throat. “You’ve haunted the lake since the flood,” she said softly. “They call you Nhalos, the Lament of the Deep.”

The leviathan’s head lowered until its breath rippled her hair. “Names,” it said. “Mortals cling to them as if they are anchors. But names are only cages.”

Zelda steadied herself. “Why have you called me here?”

Its eyes gleamed. “Because you dream of drowning.”

Her breath caught. “You lie.”

“Do I?” The leviathan’s tone was silken now, seductive in its vastness. “Every night you close your eyes and feel the world’s weight pressing upon you—the crown, the kingdom, the endless pleading faces. You wish to sink beneath it all. To drift where duty cannot follow.”

Zelda’s lips parted, but no words came. The creature’s voice seemed to thrum within her very blood, awakening something nameless.

“You mistake burden for weakness,” she said finally. “I bear the crown because I must. Not because I wish to escape it.”

Nhalos chuckled—a sound like the rumble of shifting mountains. “Such bravery,” it murmured. “Such loneliness.”

The dock creaked as its vast body coiled beneath her, the water rising around the wood like a slow tide. “Come with me, Zelda of Hyrule. See what the lake hides. Let me show you the kingdom beneath the reflection.”

She drew her dagger. Its short blade shimmered faintly with sacred runes. “You would drag me to your abyss?”

The leviathan tilted its head, mockery—or perhaps amusement—flickering in its glowing eyes. “Drag you? No. I would invite you.”

Its voice deepened, a purr that seemed to vibrate through the very marrow of her bones. “There are treasures in the dark. Lost relics of power. Knowledge that even your ancestors dared not touch.”

Zelda hesitated. Curiosity flared like a dangerous flame. The scholar within her whispered temptation.

“Knowledge,” she said slowly, “has its price.”

“Everything does,” said the leviathan. “Even ignorance.”

The words slithered into her like a knife of honey. The night air felt suddenly heavy, the scent
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