"Do you still have it?"

"Yeah." He reached into a knapsack and held out the ocarina.

"I'm going to teach you a song.” I explained. “This is the song many call, 'Saria's Song.'"

I lifted the ocarina to my lips. I played the first few notes of the song. "There, now you try." I said to him.

He nodded and played the notes perfectly.

I grinned. "Good! You can use this song to communicate with me. Any time you want to talk to me, just play that song."

I felt a stirring deep inside of me. It was time for him to go. Strange. In his presence, my powers had grown stronger.

You had to wonder about that kid.

We said goodbye, and he fled back into the forest.

The next big event happened not long after that. The day Ganondorf came to power.

I did some checking up on him. He was born in a place called Gerudo Valley, nearby Gerudo Fortress, which is a place filled with female warriors.

Apparently, there is the one male Gerudo born every one hundred years. He is the one for this century. The Gerudos admired him and made him their leader. The Gerudos are thieves, so of course, no one trusts him. He claims to be loyal to the King of Hyrule. But with a little mind probing (hey, if it would save Link's life, I really didn't think she would mind), I discovered that that's not what Princess Zelda thinks. And after communicating with Link via ocarina power, I learned the whole truth.

So, with this on my mind, I walked up to the hill in front of the Lost Woods, the highest part of the Kokiri Forest.

I heard footsteps and then Mido appeared beside me.

He began to chatter on about Link, what a wimp he was being for leaving the forest, yadah yadah. I glared at him, annoyed, wanting to be alone so I could figure this Ganondorf person out. But Mido was being too dense for subtle hints.

Plus the fact that he knew that Link was my best friend. That I didn't like hearing people talk about him that way.

Rage flooded my system. Eyes burning, I faced Mido. He still didn't notice.

But then, something behind him, out of the forest, caught my eye. Mido stopped talking and stared at me. "Saria? Are you all right?"

I felt my rage turn to dread, and then to ice-cold fear.

Dark clouds were rolling in. Raindrops as big as the leaf of a Deku Scrub. They seemed to burn into my skin like acid. Lighting the width of the Great Deku Tree.

We're talking large.

And at the head of it, riding a horse, was the King of Evil himself. Ganondorf.

As he rode through Hyrule, the dark clouds followed. Everything under them was instantly frozen or destroyed.

They were almost to the entrance of the forest.

I grabbed Mido's shoulder. He was too frightened to notice. "Listen," I shouted into his ear. You had to shout, or you couldn't be heard. It was like a being near a tornado. "You stay here. I'll round up the other Kokiri. DON'T MOVE!"

He nodded stiffly, eyes fixed on the clouds. I doubted he would have moved anyway, even if I had told him to.

I raced down the hill and into the village. Luckily, everyone was outside watching the clouds. Too scared to do anything else, they followed me to the Lost Woods.

We jammed into the entrance and to the first open area surrounded by tree trunks. Heart pounding in my ears, I lead the way to my secret place--the same place at which I had taught Link my song--not long ago at all, and yet, it seemed as though years had passed.

We reached the Sacred Forest Meadow. I looked carefully for the Wolfos. It was going to be tough, dragging six or seven kids past that thing and over the fence.

But then I remembered---when Link had come, he had destroyed the Wolfos. The gate had fallen and been laying on the ground ever since.

We hurried through the entrance. The clouds were moving in fast. I didn't think we'd make it.

But even if Link had killed the Wolfos, and another had not reappeared, you couldn't say the same for the Deku Scrubs. We raced along the corridors of the natural maze, dodging flying Deku nuts from the Scrubs. Several times a Kokiri was hit, and would cry out in pain. Luckily, it didn’t take a lot of coaxing to get him or her up and moving again. Too scared to do anything else, they jumped up, ignoring the pain, and waited to see where I would lead them. Boy, was I glad I knew this forest so well. Our lives depended on it.

At last, we reached the Forest Temple. We probably could have been able to get inside, but I didn't want to take that chance. The storm was enough to deal with. Who knew what lurked inside that place?

Instead, we huddled underneath it. We waited there, for at least one week. I was the only one brave enough to venture to find food, and even then, I wouldn’t go far. But we managed. A couple caught a cold from the icy rain, but I knew it would wear off.

Finally, the storm clouds cleared. I could see them moving back to the castle. I breathed a sigh of relief and fell to the ground. Then, something strange happened, which I seemed to have no control over. I began laughing. I hadn't had time to be afraid, what with keeping the others from freaking out. I was laughing from sheer relief. But once I started, I just couldn't stop.

Mido glared at me. "Saria," he demanded, rather irked, "what's so funny? I see nothing funny here." But I was giggling too hard to answer.

For a second I thought Mido was going to slug me. But then his face broke into a grin, and he began laughing, too. Soon all of the Kokiri were rolling on the ground, laughing hysterically until tears came to our eyes.

When we finally stopped laughing, we dragged ourselves to our feet and headed back to our tree houses. They were a little messed up, but we spent the next month or so fixing them up, and soon it was like nothing had happened.

At least, not to our houses.

The people who had once lived in Hyrule Castle Market Town passed through our village. And they had stories to tell.