Disclaimer--- Don’t own ‘em…. yet…

Author’s note--- This story is another chapter in my long-running Dragon Chronicles. Not every story in this series will be listed on FF.net, but all of them are listed in chronological writing order on my webpage. If you’d like to find out more about Zelda or other characters that will appear later in this series, visit my website at http://members.fortunecity.com/zeldathedragon and go to the information page. The rest of my stories can be found in the fanfiction section.

Rating- PG 13 for 100% of your RDA-endorsed daily requirement of angst.

 

 

 

The Spiritfall Saga

 

Part Three

Spiritfall

Written by Zelda

 

                What scared her was the feeling of being alone, and she didn't know why. She tried to reason it over several times in her head, stretched out on some mossy log or dry stone in the autumn cold. But the answers hadn't come. Only three years before, she had this land, and it was enough. Then, she had the Ducks. Such a violent disconnection from her home had been unsettling when she set up residence in Anaheim, she remembered well. But her clan had been supportive, and since she had learned to live so detached. She'd gotten used to it, really. Now, she was back home and without her Ducks for only a time, and yet for some reason she didn't feel home at all. She didn't have either her kind or the Ducks... and she just didn't know why. Zelda would have grown frustrated, to the point of real anger if it weren't for her exhaustion. As the days passed, she watched Silver's wound heal, and she watched the plenty of the autumn revitalize her kind. Yet she had not followed them. Nightmares plauged her with increasing frequency. She lost a sense of connection with her surroundings. She knew that Dragaunus was at the core of this disorientation, but the problem seemed bigger and stranger than him alone. There was something deeper than the violation of her trust, that was causing her such problems. Again she found herself peering through a fog and not seeing through it clearly, but this was no tangible fog. It was a fog inside herself. Lost, Zelda wandered distractedly and became more and more isolated from her friends.

 

                Not that it went unnoticed. The others, especially the leaders, had cast a keen eye to Zelda's radical condition. It had created a bit of an uneasiness amongst them. Although Northstar had raised the issue with Wildwing, it was Silver who had worried about her the most.

                Now he stood on a ridge in the cold, watching her from a distance. In ten minutes, she hadn't moved save for her breathing, laying draped on a mossy fallen log over the stream. The wind whipped his feathers the wrong way and stung his skin as he ambled down to her on his injured wing. It took a while for her to hear him.

                "Lucky I wasn't going to pounce on you Zel." he chuckled. "You would have ended up one wet, cold dragon." He shuffled onto the log beside her, and her face brightened a little.

                His affect faded quickly, however, when she looked him in the eyes. She didn't say anything and swung her head back to rest on the log.

                "Zelda what's wrong?" he asked her. "You've been so... distant these past few days."

                There was a long silence.

                "It's nothing." she grumbled.

                Silver decided to take a serious approach. "Zelda, you've never been a good liar, not to us." he said frankly. "Something's wrong."

                Zelda sighed and turned away from him.

                "I'm sick of worrying about you."  he said. "I know this is about me and I want to help."

                "It's not about you." she answered, irritated.

                "I mean what happened with Dragaunus... I remember it better now." he shook his head. "I understand that you blame yourself."

                Zelda rumbled lowly.

                "Zelda, you can't ignore what he's done. You tried your hardest to keep this battle between Dragaunus and yourself, I understand that." he draped a wing over her cold flank. "But you couldn't have prevented what happened, even with Ibid."

                Zelda snorted a bit and pulled away from him.

                "Zelda please just hear me out. You can't control what he does. It was his choice to attack us instead of you. Now, he's brought the battle into the Territory."

                "I tried... so hard..." she let out a sigh.

                Her anguish put a strain on Silver. "But you never failed Zel. You knew it was only a matter of time before he punished us for refusing to help him."

                "I refused." she corrected angrily. "This never concerned the rest of you... he did this to get to me...."

                "You're letting him succeed then, aren't you?" he asked.

                Zelda hesitated.

                Silver saw that he had caught her on something, and smiled. "Zelda, you've gotta realize that he's the one who did this, not you. It's payback time! Go back to Anaheim and kick some Saurian tail! Make him regret the fact that he ever set foot here." He hoped it would fire the dragon up, but instead she sighed again.

                "I can't go back.... not now." she said. "He has succeeded... I can't deny that. I can't make him fear me anymore."

                "Is that all you have? Fear?" Silver asked a bit scornfully.

                Zelda rumbled a bit. "One could argue... that is all he has against me." With this, she curled her head under her paws and said nothing further.

                Silver knew she wasn't going to talk. The wind was very cold, and so the eagle sat down on the damp log beside her, and closed his eyes to sleep.

 

                Grin mopped his bill with his sleeve, the rough fabric grating against his eyelids. He gave an exhausted look up to the Jumbotron, ignoring the flashing lights and the video replay. 32 seconds left... just 32 seconds to try and pull even with the Maple Leafs. Leading by one goal... it was only 2-1. They had thrown everything they had at that goalie! He and Tanya had both been worn out by the constant pressure from the Leafs' offense. A quick glance back at Wildwing saw the goalie leaning over on his knees in fatigue. As Duke stooped over to take a faceoff nearby, Grin gripped his stick tightly and knew it was going to take a big drive to tie this game up. The ice sprang to life as the puck was dropped, and snapped back to him. Grin looked up and saw Nosedive streaking ahead to center ice, and Grin slapped the puck towards him. Tanya suddenly yelled at him, and he looked over to see her gesturing up ice. Nosedive had the puck. Grin hustled up ice as Dive got caught up in the Leafs' defensive pinch.       

Double-teamed, Dive fell to the ice, but didn't lose the puck.

                Mallory caught it up through the scrum and fired it on goal. The goalie, however, was in the way. The rebound came out to the Leafs' right wing, and he fired it back down the ice, all the way into Tanya's corner. The crowd gave audible signs of frustration as Tanya scurried back to retrieve the puck from behind her, and Grin looked up at the Jumbotron again. 15 seconds! He missed the fact that Zelda reminded them of time limits in situations like this.

                "Fifteen!" He heard Wildwing yell, banging his goalie stick on the ice for emphasis. "Let's go!"        Tanya fired the puck up to Duke, who slipped it between the legs of a defenseman and worked by him.

                Grin drove up the ice and towards the net, this was it.

                Duke pulled a clever move by faking a shot and sliding the puck across the crease to Mallory, who was open and waiting on the other side.

                She wound up and made a hard one-time shot, the crowd giving a collective gasp.

                But the Leafs' goalie shoved himself off of the opposite net post and stretched out his massive glove, snagging the puck in the webbing. He tossed the puck back over his net to his defensemen.

                "Five seconds!"

                Grin by now was already at the point, and darted in behind the net for the puck. He slammed the defenseman to the boards and tried to prod the puck away, but the puck was recollected by another Maple Leaf. As Grin tripped over the defenseman's stick and fell to the ice, the puck was flipped easily high in the air and back down, skidding to a stop just as the final horn sounded.

                "And the Leafs come up with wonderful defensive and goaltending work in order to hold the Ducks off!" the announcement rang throughout the Pond. "The Leafs take it 2-1!"

                The crowd, obviously unsettled, got up and started to leave in one big rush. Some pounded angrily on the boards.

                Totally exhausted and out of breath, Grin picked himself up and skated back to the bench, joining the team in filing into the locker room as the Leafs gathered to congratulate themselves on the win.

 

                "Dang!" Nosedive threw his helmet against his locker with a loud crash.

                The rest of the team, silent with breathlessness and disappointment, were surprised.

                "Hey!" Wildwing snapped right back at him, spinning around from his own locker as he unbuckled his pads. If Zelda were here, she would have had the energy to get into Dive's face and teach him some control, but Wildwing felt as if he could barely stand. So he flopped down on the bench and gave a tired glare to his teammates. "We can't be angry at ourselves..." he began. "I think we've all played ourselves to the point of collapse."

                "Got that right..." Mallory panted.

                "It was a close game... too close." Tanya agreed.

                "It's frustrating." Nosedive spoke up, still not making eye contact with his older brother.

                "You're not the one who let the winning goal in." Wildwing shot back.

                "Yeah well if we had some more dedicated defense..." Nosedive muttered under his breath.

                Tanya was on her feet. "Care to say that to my face you little--"

                "Enough!" Mallory yelled.

                The team fell silent again.

                "All of you bickering like ducklings." she sat back and put her head down, rubbing her still-sore wrist.

                "We tried our hardest, that's all we could do...." Grin seconded her. "The better team won, that's how it's supposed to work."

                Wildwing nodded soberly. "They're right... we shouldn't be fighting like this. What we need is rest and a good solid practice or two." He stacked one of his leg pads in his locker. "The reason that we're all so ticked is that we gave it our all tonight, and we still lost. Am I right?"

                None of them spoke up to argue.

                "Grin's right, the better team edged us out... barely. Let's just move on."

                The team slowly stacked their gear up and left the locker room in silence.

 

                It had been at least a week after they had returned to Anaheim from New York, and Grin had kept that strange feeling with him ever since. Not only did he miss Zelda, not only was he worried about her, but he knew that something was simply wrong with her. A day or so after they had arrived back, Wildwing had related his conversation with Northstar to him in confidence. Just why, Grin had never questioned. But Wildwing seemed to be worried about what the griffon had said. Now, these days later, Grin knew that he was right. He sensed a deep void in Zelda, something so radical that it was evident to him even cross-country. It had distracted him a lot lately... he even had thought about it during games sometimes, and it annoyed him. He knew the Ducks had left a com with the other leaders just in case, but he didn't want to bother Zelda. Something in him led him to trust her to resolve her problems on her own. It was a matter beyond the Ducks, and they wouldn't be of much help if anything. So the big Duck sat down to meditate, to try and regain his strength after such a hard game, and to clear his mind.

 

                She stood alone in a bonefield, and all around her there was nothing but endless lines of bone in the sand. They almost seemed to rise up around her, the soil eroding from the rounded vertebrae. Zelda backed away slowly, her tension growing as white, curved ribs poked from the earth, rising like fangs from the ground. She found them nearly crowding around her, curving up and sliding against her legs, her flank. Skulls, feet, wings began to emerge, and the dragon suddenly realized that all of these bones, all of these carcasses, were those of her own kind! The dragon tried to fly up, but the ribs had locked her feet to the earth, the hands and feet and jaws of these long-dead creatures crumbling loosely as they tried to hold her in place. Zelda started to panic, pulling harder, crying out. And suddenly there was a great blast of cold, so strong it would have knocked her over if she weren't locked standing. The wind forced her down, crouching dangerously close to the daggers of ribs at her feet. Then she heard another sound, even above the deafening roar of the wind. She heard the crackle and snap, the spitting of flames. Zelda looked up to see a towering wall of fire growing, approaching her from the horizon. In all this cold, the fire raced for her, feeding on the bones, splintering them and incinerating them upon the very brush of the flames. Terrified, Zelda tried to wrench herself free again, but the bones locked tighter around her legs with every struggling move. The cold wind blasted her back, and the firewall, now so huge that she could no longer see its top, came barreling for her, the bones even in its vicinity exploding violently into dust. The bones, the living, moving skeletons of thousands of her kind, fed the rage of the fire. The dragon screamed, helpless and alone, as the flames towered around her, searing her flesh, tearing into her frame,

                And all she felt was the cold.

 

                Flinging herself back into reality with a spasm of fear, the dragon rolled right out of her bed and thudded on the floor. The fall only scared her more, and she backed against the wall. The first thing she saw in the darkness was the fire, burning at the cave's end for heat. The dragon screamed in panic and spun around to dart away, a move which caused her to slam right into the stone wall of the cave.

                By now, the three other leaders were up and realized what had happened.

                Diamond leapt down and grabbed the dragon by the shoulders, trying to hold her down. This only served to fuel Zelda's panic.

                Silver and Northstar were by now blocking the exit to the cave.

                "Diamond! Back away!" Silver recommended.

                The dragon, barricaded in by her friends, had nowhere to go but back into the fire. It took a few seconds for reality to take hold of her again. She stood, gasping for breath, slowly trying to sort out what had happened.

                "Zelda?" Northstar asked, walking slowly towards her.

                Exhausted and bewildered, the dragon sat down on the stone floor. The others knew that she was okay.

                "Zelda, what happened?"

                "...Nightmare..." she breathed.

                The others exchanged worried glances.

                Northstar rumbled deeply and nuzzled his beak against the dragon's bruised snout. "It's okay." he said quietly, soothingly. "It's okay."

                Zelda nodded, still dumbfounded as to what happened.

                Diamond shook her head. "This is terrible Zelda." she said. "What did you see?"

                Zelda stared at the ground, trying to put her thoughts into some order. "I... I don't know... " she breathed. Still consumed with panic, it was all the others could do to calm her down.

                "It's alright Zel, get a hold of yourself." Silver urged gently.

                "I have..." she assured.

                "Come on Zel, I can't remember the last time you woke up from a nightmare like that." Diamond remarked, hoping to jar her memory.

                "Can't remember the last time you had a nightmare." Silver added.

                "Not here... at least." Zelda nodded. "I don't understand."

                Northstar walked past her and back to poke at the fire. "That's a dream for you." he shook his head. "You should get back to sleep if you can Zelda, you need your rest."

                "Agreed." Diamond nodded. "You didn't hurt yourself?"

                Zelda cracked a light grin. "Head or flank, it all feels the same." she rubbed the moss bandage still strapped around her stomach.

                Seeing her smile, Diamond and Silver hopped back into bed.

                "'Star's right, get back to sleep Zel." Silver yawned, giving her a gentle wave of his wing, and he pulled a blanket over him.

                Zelda shivered a bit. "Think I'll just catch some fresh air..." she strolled slowly out of the cave, parting through the covering fronds of the willow tree and emerging out into the frozen night. Bitingly cold, the sky was clear and the trees were bare. The moon reflected off of the shifting ripples of the river before her. Her breath freezing strait from her nostrils, Zelda sat on the cold stone and peered out from beneath the big rock overhanging the entrance to the Den. She heard a deep rumble behind her, and Northstar sat next to her.

                "Clear night." he said approvingly. "Wonderful for seeing the stars."

                Zelda's eyes faded slowly, and she muttered emptily. "If they could be seen..." she breathed. Shivering in the cold, she turned around and went back inside, leaving Northstar alone in the night, looking back at her.

 

                And so a downward spiral continued in the Territory. The leaves soon began to fall from the trees completely, leaving bare boughs that clashed in the wind. The noise they made only created more reasons, more excuses for Zelda's sleeplessness. Cold rain fell and frosts blanketed the forest in a sheet of crystalline ice. Yet as the stinging cold drove those of the Territory into the warmth of their dens and nests, it drew Zelda out. She could no longer be confined to the Den, or be held safely in the security of sleep. Despite her still-weakened condition, she spent more and more time out in the cold, and less time under the watchful eyes of her friends. The rift between her and her fellow leaders grew wider, regardless of their stepped-up efforts to pull her back into the warmth and safety of their supervision.

                It was that same warmth that greeted Northstar as he came sluggishly back into the Den on a crisp, dark night.

                Diamond looked up, in the middle of rebandaging Silver's wing, and Silver gave Northstar a mirroring hopeful stare.

                With tired eyes and a gruff snort, Northstar shook the frost out of the feathers along his powerful neck, and sat down by the fire with them.

                "You still haven't found her?"

                "It's hard to smell her in all this cold." he shook his head. "And your nose stops working after a time, hm?"

                Diamond nodded sympathetically.

                The griffon took a carved wooden bowl from the floor and ladled a thick vegetable stew out for himself, eating thoughtfully. "She shouldn't be out this late."

                "It's not like she hasn't done this before..." Diamond began.

                Northstar looked up at her curiously.

                The lioness eased off from her fabricated answer. "I know, I know, I'm wrong." she admitted. "She hasn't... not like this."

                The griffon ruffled his feathers and looked distant. "It is as I feared." he said lowly.

                The other two looked down at the ground.

                "What can we do?" Silver asked sadly. "I feel... as if I'm a part of this."

                "We all are... in a way." Diamond said. They looked to the griffon with a hopeful spark in their eyes, and Northstar paused in looking back. Something made him, for once, shrink away from their gaze.

                "Give me time to think." he pleaded half-heartedly. With a swish of his tail, the griffon went outside into the cold again, to sit on top of the rock above the Den, and to ponder.

 

                It had been a long time since he felt such uncertainty in his life. It had been a long time since he had been unable to greet the questioning eyes of his friends with some kind of an answer. In the crisp, still night, the griffon hardly noticed the cold of the rock against his fur as he slumped over the stone that shaded the entrance to the cave. He thought hard, and remembered. He remembered back to a time... at least ten years ago to be sure, that he received many of those questioning looks. It was a year of turmoil, that and the few that would follow. The old leaders began to buckle and fall, too weak with age to battle back against what remained of the Plauge. They carried it inside their ancient frames like rot within the trunk of the strongest oak, which would fester and spread until the mightiest tree would crumble to the touch. Canter had begun to show it first, her gentle, soft and lionhearted spirit slowly starting to harden and wear away. The griffon remembered it well, being only about ten years of age at the time. He remembered the day when he came into a circle of his distraught kind, and beheld the lifeless body of one of the last surviving creatures who held memory of the Caves, of the North. That day, the fighting broke out over who would replace her. Such irony, Northstar reflected these many years later, that the life of so gentle a leader would end in such blood. He was too caught up in the fighting at the time to wax poetic on the matter. But the Tournaments, with all their violence, held true to their purpose. This, some thirty years later, was what he had become, a living reflection of his former leader. He had several more years time in his position than the others, as he had watched the three other leaders die around him, and learned from their age. Diamond was the youngest, then there was Zelda, and Silver in their positions. He had been there to welcome them all, and often had be been the giver of advice. These years later, nothing had changed. Until now, he supposed. Northstar puzzled over the matter of Zelda's condition, wondering if it really was as he feared. He flashed back to what he had said to Wildwing before he left, and wondered if he overreacted. Of course the Duck couldn't tell the difference anyway, but it was a matter of personal irritation. He had never heard of a spiritfall, save for old stories the elders told. He had sought their counsel on the matter over the past few days, but their stories had served of little comfort to him. There were no symptoms for Diamond to calculate, no problems that Zelda would let Silver analyze. But what was his role in this matter? How would he wedge himself so as to leverage the dragon out of this problem, whatever it was? For once, he was the one asking the questions, and they were serious enough to start to tear him rough at the edges, just as the wind did his feathers. As he mused over all the confusion in his head, he heard a twig snap in the distance. The frosty leaves crunching beneath her feet, Zelda came plodding slowly back for the cave, ignorant to the noise she was making. Head down, came to the side of the river, stepping methodically on the stones and passing into the cave without even realizing Northstar was there. The griffon stood to follow her, still not being able to answer anything.

 

                Zelda came in slowly, her muscles tight with the cold.

                Silver and Diamond stood to meet her, but she neither met their gaze nor said a word. Silver and Diamond exchanged glances.

                As the dragoness turned to climb up into her bed, the eagle suddenly slid in her way, stretching his injured wing before her.

                The dragon stopped and met his gently confrontational eyes.

                Northstar came in during all of this, confused. A glance to Diamond resolved everything: they were to find out now.

                Zelda snorted lowly and tried to push Silver's wing aside gently, but the eagle would not let her pass. Finally, she spoke. "Silver..." she started.

                "Zelda, stay with us a while." he pleaded.

                The dragon sat reluctantly.

                The three joined her to form a circle by the fire.

                "No more stories Zelda." Diamond began gently, almost nervously. "Tell us what's going on."          The dragon tossed her head like an irritated horse and slid back. "I told you." she shot a glare in Silver's direction. "This concerns none of you."

                "On the contrary." Northstar broke in with a stronger voice. "You know well this concerns all of us."

                Again the dragon found noises instead of words. It got the message across better to the others.      "My fears Zelda, have both confused me and made me doubt myself." Northstar continued sternly.

                Zelda shrank a bit.

                "You know, don't you?"

                "They are stories..." she blurted. "Stories, tales."

                "And you." he continued. "You are the keeper of those stories. You know." he ruled.

                Zelda paused, but her eyes could not lie. Quivering and gray, they showed that Northstar was right.

                "Tell us." Silver pleaded. "Tell us what's wrong."

                The dragon growled, actually bordering on anger. "It doesn't concern you." she said darkly, turning her frustrated gaze to the wall.

                Diamond looked at her hopelessly, and Silver hesitated. But there was one growl in reply. Northstar was gentle but firm as he gripped the bottom of her jaw and lifted her head to face the group again.

                "You know." he snarled. "You know exactly what it is, you know it's stronger than you. It's not stronger than us, you know that much."

                "I don't know that." Zelda choked, trying to pull away from his blazing golden eyes.

                "Blast your altruism!!!" he snapped and released her.

                Shocked, the whole group stared at the ruffled griffon.

                "Don't protect us this time Zelda. It is not stronger that us, why do you fear we'll be pulled in too?"

                Zelda was still stunned, but answered him. "...It took me... so easily...."

                "Easily as you forgot how weak we are, when we are alone." he ruled angrily. His purpose of breaking her shell done, Northstar softened and saw how his gruffness had hurt her and surprised the others. He brushed the dragon gently with his wing and rumbled.

                It was Diamond's turn now. "Zelda please, we want to help. We have to help! We can't let this happen to you." she pleaded. "Tell us what's been going on."

                Broken and tired, Zelda relented. "You know the gist of it." she sighed, and lay on the stone floor of the cave. "It's been so long... I'm not sure when it started... maybe with Ibid.... maybe before."

                "What started?" Diamond asked.

                "The... feeling." she quivered. "The feeling."

                "What is it?"

                "Like... I'm not all here.... like I don't belong here."

                "But you're home." Silver broke in, trying to sort things out.

                "I know... but yet I'm not." she tried to explain, frustrated.

                "And it's grown beyond that." Diamond pressed.

                "I've... been having nightmares." Zelda confessed. "Why I can't sleep. I've been losing my sense, my sense of place, of direction... I've been lost even here. I've lost you." She shivered a bit.       Northstar took this in quietly, claw on beak, musing.

                "But why is this happening?" Silver asked. "What triggered this?"

                "I don't know." Zelda shook her head. "I can't tell... that's why I'm so lost."

                There was a heavy pause in the conversation, as if the other three leaders had fallen to the same sad pondering Zelda had been doing for nearly two weeks.

                "Do you remember them?" Silver asked suddenly.

                "What?" Zelda asked, distracted.

                "Your nightmares." he said, thinking carefully. "They might give us a clue...."

                "Yes." Diamond seconded. She broke off only to pull a log from a small stack in the corner and place it gently in the fire.

                Zelda watched the sparks rise and fade with her dull eyes, thinking. The three waited as she tried to recollect her thoughts. She closed her eyes and laid her ears back.          

                "Nothing?" Northstar asked.

                "All a jumble." she sighed. "I can't go back..."

                "You have to Zel." Diamond pleaded with her.

                Zelda shook her head again wearily, giving up. "Let me sleep." she pleaded back, not facing any of them. She again got up and slowly tried to reach her bed.

                The others exchanged worried glances, but they were all tired and decided to let her go.

                Still slow with the cold, she pulled herself up into her bed and disappeared within a heap of blankets and moss, not making another movement or another sound.

                Not having moved themselves, the three leaders were silent and continued to talk with each other through their looks. However, all they came up with were confused and empty glances.

                Only Northstar did not engage in conversation, and sat looking at the stone floor. He was decided, confirmed on his suspicions. Heaving himself up, he climbed up into his own bed.

                Left alone and now even more confused, Diamond and Silver stared alternately at the two. Finally, they themselves turned aside and up to bed.

                The only thing that stayed awake was the fire.

 

                As the winter set in with its frozen darkness, the animals of the Territory began to reflect Zelda's turmoil in themselves. Knowing something was desperately wrong with their leader, they all began a retrograde into the state they were in only a few weeks before. Some tried to patronize the dragon when they saw her, crunching amongst the frosty leaves with a glaze over her eyes. They, however, were sadly spurned away, at times with bitterness and at times with Zelda simply walking away. In a matter of days, they realized that it was of little use. They cast a worried eye to her, but felt uneasy in doing anything about it. And their chances quickly shrunk. Zelda would disappear from the eyes of all but the leaders for days at a time. Sometimes, she would never leave her bed. On other days, she would not return to it until the dead of night. Perhaps it was the cold, perhaps it was her condition, but her heart hardened and turned indifferent of the world around her. She could be covered with frost or dangerously close to the blazing fire, and would not lose the distance and grayness in her eyes. Music failed to stir her, and she lost recognition of the rest of the natural world. Human speech faded quickly from her. In all aspects, she was a total recluse of spirit. However, she kept moving throughout the small space of the Territory, walking like a ghost at the same slow pace, her breath fogging the air as she went. Northstar's hunch, though he was slow to reveal it and still doubted himself, was passed onto Diamond and Silver. He knew Zelda to be in a spiritfall. The very idea puzzled, and horrified, and worried the three until they were nearly beside themselves. But it seemed to be undeniable.

                It was on one cold evening when the three leaders were huddled inside the Den, against the snow, that Silver made a proposal. He hobbled up to his nest, and fumbled beneath a mess of blankets and feathers, until he pulled out something in his balled wing. He revealed it to the other two as one of the Ducks's coms!

                "Where on earth did you get that?" Diamond asked, a bit taken aback.

                Silver hid the com in his feathers again, as if it were some contraband item. "I asked them for one... before they left." he explained slowly.

                Northstar ruffled his feathers a bit at this.

                "I know I shouldn't have..." Silver muttered aloud. "I don't know why I did... to this day."

                "You'd better not let Zelda see that." Northstar noted quietly.

                Silver nodded. "I was thinking." he continued. "Surely they must be worried."

                Diamond nodded slightly. "I'm sure they are..." she started. "But is it wise to let them know?"

                "They could be a distraction again." Northstar nodded. "But I don't know of what level this time. They may actually make things worse."

                "You make a good point..." Silver said. "This isn't about them."

                "It's about her." Northstar nodded.

                "If she rejects her basest elements," Diamond also agreed. "There's nothing to say that the Ducks could solve anything."

                "Still, they might wish to know." Silver looked at the com, then closed his feathered fist again decisively. "No." he muttered. "If she wishes their worry she'll seek it out. She knows where to find it. There's no need to have them fretting over her too." He went back and buried the com deep in his blankets.

                Northstar sniffed the air and huffed. "I don't like this Silver." he said quietly. "She would have found that com, had she her senses, already."

                "I like it even less." Silver said, looking as if he expected Northstar not to believe him. "I have the worst fears of inviting danger back into our land with this..."

                "Oh, let us give this up for now!" Diamond threw up her paws with exhaustion. "Zelda's the ultimate way of inviting danger from there to here. We accepted that." There was suddenly a noise, and the three turned to see Zelda, poking her head from around the corner. She had been listening, but for how long? Her eyes conveyed she had only caught Diamond's words, and took them as an insult. Before any could call her back, the dragon turned and shuffled out  into the snow. They heard her crunch up to the stone above the cave, and settle down there to sleep.

                Diamond stepped forwards. "I've gotta apologize for that..." she muttered.

                But Northstar checked her, holding up a paw. "Maybe, but later." he requested. "That is a matter which she's already been chewing on for some time. Besides," he turned around and lowered his voice. "You are right."

 

                The listlessness was almost unbearable. Duke had slept so late that morning, he couldn't sleep any more. Yet, he was still tired. He sat alone in the Galley, too sleepy to eat, and too hungry to sleep. He was just plain bored. 11:30 on a Sunday and nothing was on TV! Duke muted the little one mounted in the corner in disgust. Most of all, he didn't want to watch SportsCenter, he didn't want to watch the local news. He didn't want to see any highlights, hear any jokes, about last night. They had given all they had to tie the Devils in overtime. The game was a brilliant clash, but getting only the tie was almost heartbreaking. They were winless in their last three, one loss and two ties in that order. They had done respectably against some of the top teams in the league, but the whole team seemed desperate for a win. For all their struggles, what kept them from the win column was a measly goal! The forwards were frustrated because they couldn't score, and the defense and goaltending were frustrated because they couldn't stop the scoring. The whole team just seemed disenchanted with the sport. However, today was declared an off day. No practices, no photo-shoots, no anything! Duke had slept more last night than he felt he had in a week. Still, many of the bumps and bruises he had gained during the last few games hadn't gone away. He looked across the table to find Grin meditating in absolute silence. How could he be so calm? Duke was just about to put his head on the table and drop off, when there was a noise in the hallway.

                Wildwing came in, half awake himself, and found a chair to sit in. "Sorry." he noticed Duke's grogginess.

                "No, it's okay." Duke waved back. "Couldn't sleep another wink if I wanted to. It's almost noon!"

                "Yeah, a lot of the others are still asleep too, I'd guess. I can't believe how hard we played last night." There was a melancholy tone in his voice.

                "Hey, not bad against the best team in the east." Duke shrugged. For once, he did a bad job of lying.

                Wildwing gave him a tired glance and nodded slightly. "We've gotta put this behind us." he sighed. "Three tough teams in the past five days, it's been a nightmare schedule this whole week. I think we all need the break today."

                "I'm not gonna argue with you there." Duke waved a hand.

                Wildwing yawned and frowned, rubbing his thigh. "Think I slept on this wrong." he muttered, annoyed. "Better have Tanya check it out... hope I didn't pull anything." He gave up talking and the three sat in silence for a few minutes.

                There were noises down the hallway soon afterwards, and Mallory joined them in a chair. "Morning." she said, with light sarcasm.

                "Morning yourself." Duke yawned. "Hope you're more awake than I am."

                Mallory took a few seconds to judge. "Maybe barely." she grinned slightly. "I am soooo glad we have the day off."

                "We've all got a lot of stuff to sort through." Wildwing nodded.

                "And thank goodness Draggy isn't going to make any housecalls." Mallory examined her nails carefully. "Not after the beating he took. Zelly's had him out for, how long, a few weeks now?"

                There was an awkward pause in the room.

                Mallory looked up to find her teammates staring at the table, or the floor, or something beneath. She realized what she had said. "Oops." she muttered.

                "It really has been a few weeks." Wildwing mused quietly. "Has she ever been away this long?"      Grin didn't seem to hear. He closed his eyes and lifted his beak up a bit.

                Mallory thought a bit. "Yeah... haven't heard from her at all." she said.

                "We may not for some time..." Grin broke in softly.

                The three looked at him strangely, but he didn't break his gaze.

                "What do you mean?" Wildwing asked, interested.

                "I'm not sure myself." he frowned a bit, eyes still closed. "But things aren't right with her... not yet. They're different, but not right."

                "Hmph." Wildwing nodded a bit. He knew by now, after all this time, to trust Grin's intuition. "Maybe we should go check on her. You know we do have that game in Philly this weekend..."

                "No." Grin broke in, rather abruptly for him.

                Again, the trio gave him their full attention.

                "No... I don't think that's a good idea."

                "Why not?" Mallory put her hands on her hips. "She's probably still hurt..."

                "Because I don't think it involves us." he murmured.

                "We're still her friends."

                "It's beyond us." Grin nearly glared at her.

                Mallory sat silently.

                Wildwing frowned a bit. "You and Zelda have always had the weirdest hunches about each other." he started, leaning on the table. "What's going on?"

                Grin nodded a bit, as if he knew he would need to explain. "It's her senses." he started. "Like all of her kind, she's got nearly extrasensory perception. It's not just all animal, although it's closely associated with her instincts."

                Wing and Mallory looked at him strangely.

                Grin shook his head. "Zelda's always been able to sense extreme emotions in her kin, and in us."

                "That's how she seems to know when things are wrong..." Mallory said slowly.

                "And that's how she knew that Silver was hurt." Wildwing added. "And you've got that 'sense' too?"

                "Not even close." Grin shook his head. "I wish I did. It's too closely tied to the earth for me to obtain. And her's is innate, refined by age. Mine comes through spiritual living." he bowed slightly. "They're just similar in some ways... so I can have the link to her that she has to the rest of us."

                The three still didn't understand completely.

                Duke shook his head and stood.

                "I just don't like it." Wildwing mumbled. "But you're right, this is between her and her kind. We'll leave her alone... for now."

 

                It was going to snow. Diamond could smell the iciness in the air, and could see the clouds on the horizon through the trees. It was going to snow a lot, the first big snow of the winter. The land around her was nearly empty of her kind. Silver and Northstar were napping after lunch in the Den, and she should have been with them. Everyone had been packing themselves up with a store of food, to last out the snow. But Zelda, as usual, was nowhere to be found. She had not come back to the Den to sleep the night before, the first time she had ever done that... now Diamond had been pulled out of the warmth of the cave by the strength of her worry. There was something that she felt... something like the way she felt on the day that Silver's fever broke. She felt like something was going to break, to come to a head. As she thought, there was suddenly a swoosh behind her. Diamond turned to see Zelda flapping through the cold air to land before the cave, on the sheet of ice that covered the river. Her scales seemed glazed over with a sheet of the ice itself, and her eyes as gray as the coming clouds. Diamond trotted back to her and nuzzled her bandaged side.

                With a strange expression, Zelda rumbled and beckoned her inside the cave.

                Diamond realized that she had something to say. She followed her in, and saw Northstar and Silver awaken as she came before them.

                "Zelda!" Northstar greeted warmly. "Nice to see you back again. What kept you out last night?"      Zelda closed her eyes and took a few moments to reply. "Thinking." she murmured. "About what's been happening to me."

                Silver gently slipped out of his bed, and sat beside the dragon on the floor. "What do you mean?"

                "I mean I've come back... because I've figured things out." her voice was low and weak with the cold.

                Northstar frilled his ears a bit. Could she finally...? He also slipped out of bed. "What did you figure out?" the griffon asked gently. He'd have to be careful with her. "What were your answers?"

                Zelda hung her head slowly, still slow in speaking. "I have no answers." she sighed. "But I now know they are not here."

                Northstar's hopes were crushed.

                "Zelda, what are you talking about?" Diamond asked, also distressed.

                "I must leave..." she said, with a kind of desperation in her voice. "This is tearing me apart-- I must leave."

                "Zelda..." Silver began, hesitating. "Where will you go?"

                The dragon turned away, a sickly look on her face. She let out a frustrated sigh. She didn't know. She couldn't tell.

                Northstar was at his wit's end to try and understand her. What had brought about such a change as this? Only a few weeks beforehand Zelda refused to leave Silver's side. Now she wished to abandon the Territory? What questions weighed so heavy on her soul as to drive her from her home?

                "I must leave." she finally repeated. "It is calling me... I will find my way."

                "But Zelda, you're in no condition to leave." Diamond began to counter her. "What with your injuries still not healing after all this time, and the winter---"

                "I must." she shook her head and turned back towards the exit. Her paces were staggered, as if she were almost pulling against some heavy weight to escape from the Den.

                Diamond suddenly realized that the last thing Zelda wanted to do was to leave. She simply had to. But why?

                The dragon reached the willow curtain and stopped, breathing slowly. She swiveled her head around and looked back with the saddest eyes, already brimming with tears.

                Those behind her were still racing to come to grips with all that was happening.

                With a sudden howl of frustration, the dragon slammed her head into the stone floor, staggering to get up. "By the stars!" she cried out. "I can't leave you, not now, not like this!"

                This outburst brought her friends to her side.

                Silver wrapped the dragon up in his wings. The show of his injury only seemed to hurt Zelda more, and she was reduced to a shivering, choking heap of scales.

                The three were amazed, but still tried to help her stand again.

                "Zelda." Silver insisted, striving for some clarity on the matter in his own mind. "If something calls you, answer it. Go!"

                Zelda did not return his gaze.

                He shook her gently and forced her to look at him. "Don't worry about us. Go."

                "You won't be at peace with yourself if you stay." Northstar agreed softly.

                Diamond took a few seconds to shake off her fearful look. "Go." she nudged the dragon. "We won't be at peace with ourselves if you stay."

                Zelda looked at them with a hopeless, confused gaze. Torn between her mysterious oppressor and her friends, the dragon hung in silence for some time. Finally, she regained her own feet and turned her back to them once again. With the same great strain, she poked her head out of the cave, and spread her wings as if they were coated with lead. Rising slowly from the forest, she wheeled about to the north.

                As she gave her powerful departing flap, the dragon let out a cry that was so tearing, it involuntarily brought tears to the eyes of those watching in the cave below.

 

                "Take a look at this Wildwing." Tanya started up suddenly from the console.

                Her leader turned from sitting on a chair nearby, and came over to her. "What is it?"

                "It's a com message... but it's not from any of us." Tanya frowned, tapping away. "Just came in."

                "Patch it up on the screen." he suggested.

                Static snapped across the huge screen of Drake 1, and suddenly the link was established. There was a massive gray blur for a moment, that focused in to reveal a feather. It was pulled away to reveal Silver, fiddling with the device.

                "Silver?" Wildwing asked, surprised.

                The eagle realized the com was working and set it back a ways, widening the view to reveal he, Diamond and Northstar sitting together in a cave.

                "I had hoped this would work." the eagle nodded a bit.

                Wildwing looked at the trio strangely. They all looked odd... disorganized and shifty, a little ragged.

                "What's wrong?" he asked. "Has something happened with Dragaunus?"

                "Thank the stars no." Northstar rumbled, ruffling his feathers. "But I fear it may be something worse. You haven't seen Zelda, have you?"

                Wildwing frowned deeply. "No, we thought she was with you." he answered.

                With the negative response, the three seemed to be even more at a loss.

                "What's going on?" he repeated.

                "We are not sure ourselves..." Diamond began slowly. "But Zelda left a few days ago... we hoped she was going back to Anaheim."

                "But she isn't here." Tanya said.

                "And so." Northstar sighed. "Our fears are confirmed... I was right Wildwing." he hung his head. "I was right about her."

                "The spiritfall." Wildwing remembered slowly.

                Northstar nodded sadly.

                "So she left? Where would she go?" Tanya asked.

                "That's what we don't know." Silver shook his feathered head. "She's taken neither kin nor com... the only clue we have is that she headed north..." he instantly fell silent.

                "What... does that mean?" Wildwing ventured.

                Northstar growled lowly. "Nothing to you Duck." he suddenly turned gruff. "There is nothing that you can do to get her back."

                "But we've got to try something... maybe our scanners?" Wildwing pressed.

                The griffon tossed his head and refused to speak further.

                Diamond replied nervously. "We really don't know, whether we should find her or not." she said. "We're so worried."

                "As are we." Tanya said. "Was she at least alright before she left? Healed up?"

                Diamond shook her head.

                "What about you?" Wildwing asked. "There won't be any fights or anything?"

                "No." Silver answered. "She's taken the only fight with her."

                Northstar snorted again.

                "I'm sorry to trouble you with this Wildwing. We are concerned about her, as I'm sure you are, and we just want to know she's safe. But we'll make no effort to find her now. She's got to do this on her own."

                "Do what?" the leader asked.

                Northstar shook his head again.

                "We'll let you know if anything comes up. Will you do the same?" the eagle asked.

          &