Disclaimer: I don't own The Legend of Zelda

A Battle of Ills
When Link is sick

About fifteen minutes into morning sparring practice, Link stares up at the ceiling of the hall and thinks that he really wouldn't mind just staying on the floor so long as no one steps on him.

This is not a perfect plan. He really should reach up and push the practice mask off his head, at least, because his eyes are kind of itchy and hot and he wants to rub at them. He thinks about it.

"Whoah! Oh come on, Zelda, I didn't hit him that hard!"

He thinks about it very much, and his hands are still lying on the floor with the rest of him when Zelda kneels by his shoulder.

"Link? What's wrong?" she says. "Are you hurt?"

She grabs his mask and yanks it off. He grimaces when the material catches his nose on the way over, but Zelda doesn't mumble a sorry. She just looks at Link for a moment, and then she's pressing her hand against his forehead and twisting to look over her shoulder.

"Commander Eagus, tell Link to go back to his room," Zelda says. "He's sick and he should be in bed."

Link is really quite comfortable right here on the floor of the sparring hall, but probably Zelda's got a point. He's a lot less likely to get stepped on in his own bed.

Eagus pulls Link to his feet and helps him shrug off his practice gear. "Got that fighting spirit, haven't you!" he says. "Good to see! But you do look a tad pale, so off you go now." He claps Link's shoulder.

Link is supposed to fold up the practice uniform and put it away at the end of sparring. He means to, but his head feels kind of funny when he bends to pick it up, and anyway Zelda's grabbed his hand and she's walking off with it.

"A cup of hot pumpkin soup, that'll do the trick!" Eagus calls after them. Link twists to look back as he's tugged along, and Eagus waves him off as he collects Link's things from the floor. "Great stuff! You'll be right as rain in no time."

Link nods. It sounds like a brilliant idea. When they enter the Academy Zelda walks the pair of them straight past the kitchen, though, so Link guesses he won't be cooking any soup after all.

Zelda squeezes his hand, then opens his bedroom door. "You should have said you didn't feel well," she says, tugging at the blanket on his bed.

The truth is that Link didn't feel not well, really. But for some reason that's never the response Zelda likes to hear, so he just sits on the edge of his bed and leans forward to take off his boots.

Zelda's already pulling them off.

His head smacks into hers and, ow, that actually does make him feel kind of not well after all. He rubs his forehead, and Zelda pushes him down and tucks the blanket around him even though Link usually doesn't bother with it.

"Get some rest," Zelda says. "I'll be back at lunch."

Link watches the door close behind her.

Link looks at his shelves and thinks that he really should water his plants.

His bed is even more comfortable than the floor of the sparring hall, though.

He still hasn't gotten up to check the pots when he rolls on his side, still half-dozing, before he even hears the window hatch banging up. It does, and he smiles at the wooden thump and stretches his arm out.

The tips of his fingers brush against his Loftwing's beak. The Loftwing pokes its head further into his room and fixes him with one eye, chirring gently. Link can hear the curiosity, and he slides his fingers up to the start of the soft, red fur. He's fine, really. He feels bad worrying his friends, because he's fine-but it makes him warm inside anyway.

Or maybe that's the fever.

The Loftwing screeches and withdraws and the window clunks shut behind it. Link thinks it's probably almost time for lunch, with the way that his stomach is shrinking from hunger, so there's really not much point in closing his eyes again and taking a nap.

He looks at his desk, where his sketchbook is lying open beside his latest carving. It's a likeness of Mia, or it will be once he finishes working the final details into the wood and can paint it.

Well, Link's got plenty of free time on his hands at the moment.

This is not a perfect plan either, because that is how Zelda finds him a little while later when she comes to check on him and bring him something to eat-gouge in hand, resting his eyes, his head laying in the scattering of wood shavings across his desk, and snoring faintly.

Zelda shakes her head, and then she shakes Link.

"I meant you should rest in bed," she says. She's taken over his chair to eat her stir-fry, which is alright, because Link is cold now after his nap and it's comfier to sit on his bed with the blanket pulled up around his shoulders. He picks a curl of wood off his own stir-fry and eats too.

Link is pretty sure Zelda is supposed to eat in the dining room with everyone else, instead of staying in his room where he is sick. He's pretty sure that's what Zelda always tells him.

"You're running a fever," Zelda says. "Shut up."