She turned her head quickly, her red hair twisting around her ivory neck and spilling down her back like wine. With her strange blue eyes narrowed and her lips tight with anger, I saw for a moment the Gerudo that lay in her blood and I grudgingly regreted my harsh words. The king's lady was more than a farmgirl, that I'd admit, but she still was an outcast in our world.

Although I saw her often in the course cloths of the peasants, she was dressed now in a long gown, probably taken from the wardrobe of the lost Hylian princess. Sapphire silk shot through with silver made her look less like a child and more like the queen she was pretending to be.

We had consulted when Ganondorf had taken her and decided that our king's activities demanded less of our concern than previously imagined. We had retreated to our fortress and temple and ignored him as he did us. The few that stayed remained at their posts mostly for show, perhaps out of loyalty or curioustity. Ganondorf's presence was certainly not necessary in our lives, but a resentment was growing in the desert: Ganondorf was not acting in accordance to our laws and the addition of an outsider into our sacred circle was an insult to all the Gerudo. Only we could accept the touch of the Hylians; the king was to remain under our protection and hidden from the other races.

The girl had been a repitable horse trainer and she was not lacking in strength and courage. Had she been Gerudo, blessed by the three faced goddess and a member of the chosen children, she would have been a fitting companion for the king. But her blood was watered down too much and she had never been accepted into the arms of the goddess. She was too flawed, too sullied. And her hands on the king left stains.

"I did not choose this life," she said at last, her voice sharp with fury, "But I will not back down from it."

"You chose to stay here," I retorted, my voice cool despite the heat of my anger. I walked a slow circle around the girl, eyeing her with unconcealed comtempt. "Your country will brand you as a traitor and taste your blood when they find out where you spend your nights."

"They will never know," she shot back. "My secrets keep themselves."

"Regardless, the goddess will judge you. You have betrayed the Hylians and the Gerudos, all for a fleeting affair of the heart."

The girl was silent. For a moment it looked like I had broken her: her face drained of blood and her eyes drifted downward to stare at the floor rather than meet my gaze. Quietly she gathered her skirts and began to turn away. She paused before reached the staircase and twisted to look back over her shoulder. "I did not fall in love," she said, her voice soft and devoid of any passion, "it was love that fell on me."

Much later, when I was back in the safety of the desert, I reflected on the conversation. I had defeated her but the reward for my win was only sadness and shame. To Nabooru I requested to be taken from my post and placed elsewhere; I refused to step back into the castle. Too many tears had been shed inside it and I couldn't allow myself to slip into the darkness that Ganondorf had created.