-Ryo's Estate, Kanyou-

High pitched screams filled the air. A door flung open, the birds squawked and flew in dust, and six tiny feet scurried out fast as they could. Fearfully they looked back, but kept their attention forward. They hurried to the wall outside of the building they had escaped, and finding it too tall and without passage to traverse, took right along the outer perimeter between the wall and the bushes. The bushes snagged at their dresses, but they did not, could not, let it deter them. Guards stood in the distance, and though they could be seen the guards would likely not aid them. They were on their own.

They fell into bushes and crouched down. Their eyes glued to the doorway they had left, unknowing of the hands behind them.

In a swift movement one of them was scooped up and lifted into the air. She screamed, the other two squealed and ran, and the guards glanced in their direction only to return to their patrol.

Everyone fell, laughing.

"Ryo!" The caught one cried, "How do you always find me!"

Ryo continued to hold her and spun around with her enveloped in his large clothes. The girl was much smaller than himself and so was swallowed up entirely. After spinning a time or two he stopped and put her down. Giggling, he lifted the blindfold, "Because I know your smell well, my dear."

"You cheated!" She pouted.

"I am guilty of nothing more than an ambition and virility far beyond my years! And a large nose!" He laughed. He softened her pouting and turned them to squeals with kisses before chasing after the other girls as well. They played for some time but it stopped as Ryo saw Rishi approach with a disgruntled look. This was nothing new, as Rishi, Ryo's chief minister of law, seemed eternally vexed by human's fallacies in the face of order. He spent his days, weeks, and months in isolation writing and was unnaturally pale, though also handsome as he was never burned by the sun.

"Ah, Rishi!" Ryo greeted his friend and ally. "Come join us! Sukki there is still beyond my reach and speed. Your aid in catching her should end her reign! To the winner goes the spoils, aint that right my pretties?" Ryo smiled lecherously towards his little concubines.

Rishi eyed them with disdain, frowned at their dirty, sweaty appearance, and sighed at their perverted antics. He shook his head. He said, flatly, "We have a report from our spy in Zelda's camp."

Ryo caught another girl and held her in a bear hug, but stopped on hearing Rishi's word and tone. He let his own demeaner fall from being so cheery, though he continued to hold the concubine. She looked up curiously at him.

Seeing he had Ryo's attention, Rishi continued, "The harem has sent a message to Zelda. The message bore the king's seal and was entirely blank. No words were written on the scroll."

Ryo's expressions shifted between various levels of confusion and thought, before becoming stoic. "I see." He said, simply. "I knew my plot against Zhao would shake Qin's foundations as well, but I hadn't expected that woman to be amongst the fruits to fall from its branches. Perhaps it is wishful thinking that I could peacefully swallow up Zelda's power without interference."

Rishi raised an eyebrow, "You actually think the harem seeks an alliance with the royal family after all this time?"

Ryo's eyes drew out towards the city. In the center, high above all though encased in walls was the palace. In a distant part of the city though, was another palace with just as many walls and just as tightly secured. The royal families' personal harem. It was here the princes and princesses were born and raised. It was here the jewels of the kingdom were locked up and preserved for the piety of the monarchy. Its walls and doors were shut tight as any fortress and armed by as many guards as the royals through their eunuchs.

"Honestly, I don't know." Ryo admitted. "Though I know them both, and I know the darkness they endured, their relationship cannot be so simply defined as 'mutual hostages'. Those two share a history and painful darkness I do not understand. If those two were to meet, I have no idea how the conversation would go."

-Royal Harem, Kanyou, Capital of Qin-

Sarah hurried. She had barely made it home to the harem before being instructed by the eunuchs to set things in order.

"Blast it, I overslept again!" Sarah chastised herself. She set her servants, Yu and Mi, to cleaning her room while she put on her best clothing. An honored guest was arriving and she needed to look her best!

Life in the royal harem had changed drastically in recent years, and no more so than for Sarah. It was still an exceedingly bloody battleground when she had entered. Sarah had no hope with her plain appearance and lack of talents to be considered a threat, and so the 'gangs' of girls ignored her. The royal harem was bloody in the era of King Shorlin from his rise to power, but its bloodshed reached full anarchy in the era of King Aou as his mindset to put the clans at rivalry intensified the flames in the harem as well. The harem had calmed, a tiny bit, in the short era of King Xiang, Zelda's father, but this king tasted no woman and so made them desperate.

Then the latest Queen Mother appeared, and all of that changed. The bloodshed stopped overnight, every girl was set to order and perfection and proper conduct, a eunuch was placed with each one as a handler. Again, Sarah was seen as unremarkable, quiet, and obedient, and so avoided the Queen Mother's attention. In truth, she had never met the Queen Mother. The harem was a palace of its own with a thousand girls, ten thousand guards and armed eunuchs, and a thousand servants. The chaos was turned to order, but there was something about it that terrified Sarah.

It was rumors, only gossip, but the whispers were that the Queen Mother was... scary, cold, distant.

Sarah would have thought she would have been called at any day to the Queen Mother's abode ever since being called to Zelda's side more than once. It had not escaped the Queen Mother's notice, surely, how her daughter favored this plain concubine? After all, Sarah was given a few servants to help keep her things tidy and more rupee than she knew what to do with! Plenty to keep her large family going well for years! Pretty soon they would be able to buy a nice large house in a higher district, with room for her cousin's family and brother's and sister's family, and more families that would come from their household! All because of her.

She had done well. She had accomplished what she set herself to do in entering the harem. So why was she terrified? Why did her hands shake?

Sarah struggled through putting on makeup haphazardly, much to Yu's groaning, before hurrying out the door as soon as there was a knock.

The day would be difficult, and life in the harem was dark and oppressive as a cage, but that didn't mean she couldn't try to let some light out of its bars. "Good morning!" She greeted cheerfully.

Tuoniao Ki, her eunuch handler, stood in the door. Unlike his normal garb of hard leather and close-fitting robes tied with a sash, he went for a ceremonial black dress barely dented by the hilt of a sword he kept beneath. A head taller than her, he looked down, his lips seemingly permanently plastered in a thin line. His eyes roved her up and down, leering and judgemental, "It'll do."

"I hope so! I can't even pronounce half of what is on my face!" Sarah giggled, ignoring how she was the only one to find it amusing.

"Hurry. We will be late." Tuoniao said sternly. He took the door behind her and slammed it shut, making her jump. Okay, so no going back for anything now. He made his point.

"Okay, well, I did want to do something more but-that-doesn't-matter-now! Lead on."

Tuoniao turned his back on her and led on down the path. Sarah picked up her skirt and hurried along after him and his long strides. They passed other girls and handlers until coming to an impasse leading into the main throne room.

Sarah didn't like the room. It was a new thing the Queen Mother had built, almost as if in a mockery of the royal palace throne room. The harem throne room was shined, with rugs leading from a large door to a higher throne with a wide decorated frame of geese and dragons and flowers on its back. Its base was wide enough to lay on, and it stood on a pedestal of exactly three steps with each step being raised up three inches high and thirty-inches apart. There were six pillars, three on each side, that kept the high raised roof, and balconies to higher floors. The pillars were so stable that small bridges extended from the inner balconies to them and looped around to create balconies on the pillars themselves.

It was beautiful, but it was also of the same design as the royal palace, exacting to every inch, with an effort to outdo it.

The girls rushed in and assembled in a rigid formation with their handlers on their left. Sarah and Tueoniao Ki found a place in the right column towards the left, two rows away from the rug.

Sarah scrunched up her nose and wrapped her hands tightly around her. She was used to crowds and close contact, but a thousand girls, a thousand handlers, and a thousand more guards, with only a few hundred servants, were shoulder-to-shoulder packed even for a room as massive as this one. Her every breath brushed the hair of the girl before her and her intake of the same sucked it into her mouth. Sarah felt every inch of her touching and exposed to another. No wonder Tuoniao was in a particular poor mood.

'This must be how crated fish feel.' Sarah thought.

The minutes ticked by. Silence reigned. Every attempt to whisper was reproached with a hard look. Every questioning look was ignored. An hour passed, and Sarah felt her legs growing weak from standing in the same position in shoes not meant for standing. Another hour passed and there were faint whimpers in her ears.

A door opened in the back and instantly a word rang out loud, "BOW!"

Instantly Sarah was on her face, as well every other girl. It didn't matter if they were on top of each other. It only mattered that they not look up. The only ones to stand rigid were the men.

'Breath.' Sarah reminded herself. 'Just breathe. Don't you dare look up!'

Sarah faintly heard the sound of walking from the throne akin to gliding and the faintest wind, and then nothing.

The door leading in opened slightly and a eunuch entered. He bowed at the door and said, "Queen Mother, High Princess Zelda is here and wishes entry."

Sarah's eyes bulged even as her nose was to the floor. What. The. Realms! Zelda was here?! What was she doing here!? Having been in Zelda's private company Sarah was privy to the details as Zelda wished, and being in the harem was thoughts of distaste between them, even as close as they had become, for no other reason than the relationship Zelda had with her mother. If anyone had told Sarah that Zelda would set foot here in a hundred years she would laugh it off as madness!

There was silence a moment, a long moment. Then finally, as if by the most beautiful and clear flute to have tickled Sarah's ears, a voice said, "Let her in, darling."

A pair of footsteps entered the door. One was heavy as a man but the other was lighter, but also with purpose. It's funny the little things you pick up on people. Sarah knew the steps anywhere. A cold sweat broke out over her and she struggled to breathe, suddenly suffocated by a cold atmosphere that filled the room. Even the other girls seemed to shake and shiver. Like a faint icy mist, whatever had already started to transpire here changed the atmosphere.

Zelda was here.

The door shut behind them, and all was silent. Zelda and her companion did not step closer, no one spoke, and no one moved. Sarah heard only the sound of her own breathing and her heartbeat racing in her ears. Sarah heard her blood race in her veins and she felt terror grip her. Facing a demon hadn't been this scary. Perhaps it was bravado and purpose that gave her courage against Ganon, or perhaps it was knowing that the greatest of demons are in men and women, like the Queen Mother.

At last, the silence was broken. A light, enchanting laugh filled the chamber from the throne. Immediately Sarah felt lightened by the voice, a bit more cheery, if only she didn't know who it came from.

The Queen Mother laughed, "What's the matter, Zelda? It's been such a long time since we last saw each other. Why don't you come closer, or it could be that you find your mother frightening?"

"Not at all," Zelda replied. Sarah gulped. She knew Zelda was lieing. Zelda would rather face a hundred armies and the worst of man than to stand here in her living nightmare. There were more than a few nights where Sarah had woken from Zelda's screaming and weeping. Zelda accepted no mirrors because she shared her mother's beauty. She accepted no men or women carnally as all that was sensual or beautiful in sex was reduced to savage raping and fucking of brutes.

Sarah heard Zelda take a few steps forward. She could only imagine the terror gripping Zelda's heart as she willed herself closer.

"Come now, let us get a good look at each other. Come closer."

Zelda took a few steps closer.

"Closer."

A few steps more.

"A little more."

A few final steps could be heard near the throne.

"Oh, that's my daughter for you. You've become quite a fine woman in the time since we last met, haven't you? Your hair falls like rivers and your eyes are as deep as oceans. Your lips..." Sarah could practically hear the Queen Mother smile, "The most sensual part of a woman is the lips. Wouldn't you say?"

"I wouldn't know," Zelda replied. "But I would say the same for you, Mother. Your beauty has not faded at all."

The Queen Mother chuckled lightly. "Thank you, my dear. It is nice to know you approve. But, this is quite a surprise. After all these years for you to actually come and pay me a visit. You don't write. You don't send messengers. It almost makes me feel neglected."

Zelda interrupted the Queen Mother's games, "Please end the innocent act. I would like for you to hand over the copy of the royal seal in your possession. For a prank, this is going too far. Were this matter to be exposed, there would be an uproar and you could be tried for treason as a traitor of the state."

The Queen Mother gasped, a hollow and fake a sound as any, "'Traitor of the state' you say? My, that does sound quite severe."

"Yes. Despite everything... I wouldn't see you punished and abused for something so trivial as a prank."

"'Abused.' A funny word to come between us, considering the lifestyle we had together in Zhao. That 'abuse' we suffered together staggers the imagination, forced to sully ourselves just to be able to eat... Yes, quite literally sullied. To be able to sink no lower must refer to that, wouldn't you say? You are the almighty heir, soon to be king, of the great state of Qin, and I, its Queen Mother. On paper, this is the two highest positions in the kingdom. No one stands above us. It is not I playing a prank, dear Zelda, I would say it is fate playing the greatest prank on us to have brought us here. I remember a certain scholar who claimed that a man's life was dictated by the heavens. If that really is true..."

A single breath passed.

Then for a moment, a single breath, the façade of a light, beautiful voice gave way to the strongest, seething venom, "Then it makes me want to piss all over the fucking heavens!"

The hateful roar echoed through the chamber and more than a few of the girls cringed fearfully, whimpering where they stayed bowed. Sarah glued her eyes shut and felt a great weight had slammed on them.

"Mother." Zelda inserted herself flatly and clearly, "Please hand over the forged seal. Let us not go down a painful road."

The Queen Mother grunted, her beautiful and light voice restored, "Hmph! Fine. Whatever. Who cares about that little toy. If you want it, go ahead and get it from the eunuchs on the way back."

"What is the meaning of this, Mother? Why would you suddenly do something like this?"

"Nothing, really, just felt like seeing your face again after such a long time."

Immediately Sarah heard Zelda spin on her heels. "Then I shall take my leave."

The Queen Mother chuckled, a light voice dripping in coldness and purpose while feigning surprise. "Leaving already? I was certain that you had come because you wished to request something of me."

"No, I changed my mind because it doesn't appear as if you would be receptive."

"That's awfully assuming when you haven't even asked, don't you think? What is the worse I could say? 'No'? Or is it because you refuse to request it from your mother? Come, let's hear it. Perhaps I am more receptive than you think."

Zelda stopped walking in the middle of the room. Sarah held her breath for-what-felt-like-the-hundredth-time. A long moment of silence passed. Sarah felt as if her soul was leaving her body and she was beyond herself. She felt a great wave of power coming over them as if the winds churned and time itself stood still to take note of this moment. Sarah knew. She knew the minds of those at work here, and she had come to understand, even at a fraction, the gravity of what was transpiring. History was being made this moment.

There would be no turning back.

Zelda turned on her heels back to face the Queen Mother, her mother. "Despite being the heir of this state, power and authority lie with Chancellor Ryo Fui due to my own incompetence. Even now, we are contesting his faction, yet we are always struggling." A breath. "Please lend me the aid of your harem faction and the families that support you, Mother."

"See, now was that so hard?"

Yes.

The Queen Mother hummed, seemingly putting on a show of thought, before coming to a decision she had likely already made, "Yes."