Disclaimer: I do not own anything from Ranger's Apprentice nor Eragon

"There will come a time when you will have to make the hardest decision of your life. Not only will this decision affect all of Alegasia and the beings that inhabit this land, but will also affect a land not yet seen to our eyes." Oromis told Anya. "I am sorry that such a hard task falls on the shoulders of one so young but that is the order in which we live."Anya nodded her head and looked off into the distance at a large golden shape chasing a smaller green shape through the air.

"And what is to become of Verdos?" Anya felt she had to ask as she watched her green dragon blow smoke at Glaedr.

"That I cannot tell you." Oromis said after a long pause. "I can only try to prepare you for what is to come the best way I see fit."

As if sensing Anya's mixed feelings and grief about the whole situation, Verdos came flying to her side. He was only 10 months old but already he was huge. Him and Glaedr landed with 2 huge tremors that shook the very earth and Verdos nudged Anya with his nose, softly and affectionately. She took the moment to stroke his nose and tried not to think about the millions of outcomes that could possibly be waiting in the future for them.

"Come. Let us retire for the hour is late." Once again, Anya just nodded and hopped on Verdos.

"I'll see you tomorrow, Master." Anya said before Verdos took off into the sky. His reply was lost to her.

"You can no longer avoid the inevitable." Murtagh yelled across to Anya. "This was for-ordained long before you and me were even born."

"The future is constantly changing." She shouted back, feeling blood dripping from the open split on the left side of her mouth. "We can choose to change."

"You were one of the lucky." Murtagh sneered at her. "And the foolish Arya."

"I am not the one fighting on the wrong side." Anya chose that moment to spit on the ground in front of her and she saw the look of disdain on his face at those words.

"Who is to say what is right and what is wrong." He asked quietly.

"You cannot possibly approve of what he's doing to those dragons' souls." Anya whispered. If he told her that he did, then all the faith that she had in him would be shattered right here and now.

"I cannot say that I do agree." He finally told her after a second of silence.

"Please." Anya tried to beg one last time for now she knew that the cause was not lost. "We don't have to fight."

"I will always have to fight you. Until you come to our side, I will always have to fight you. I have no choice." Anya knew what he was speaking of and she had no way to counter it. She was beginning to lose all hope.

"But I think that that might be very soon." A cold voice said behind her. The blood seemed to freeze in her very veins and her entire body went cold, even Murtagh's face went pale.

"Galbatorix." She whispered. She couldn't believe it.

"Yes." He drawled. "You have been quite the rebellious one. Do you know how irritated I am?"

"I could care less with how irritated you are you murder." Anya anwered in a low, dangerous voice.

"I knew that you would eventually come to a face-off with Murtagh." He said, smiling. "I only had to bide my time until the moment arose."

Not quite getting his meaning, Anya looked to Murtagh who refused to look at her now. She had a horrible feeling that she already knew where this was going and her heart started to hurt every time she took a breath.

"Yes." Galbatorix laughed. "It was because of Murtagh that I knew where to find you and your dragon. And both of you will join me. If you refuse me, you will live out the remainder of your life alone."

"You bastard." She screamed at Murtagh. "I hate you."

"Now now." Galbatorix smiled, raising both hands. "Anya. I'm giving a free choice here. Join me and become all powerful, or live the rest of your life knowing that you condemned your dragon to death."

"Go to hell." This time Anya spat blood in the general direction of Galbatorix and tried to stand. Her left leg wasn't going to hold too much weight so she stood mostly on the right and raised her sword.

"So be it." Galbatorix spat back. "But you had a choice to avoid bloodshed here. Remember that when you have nothing in your head but your own thoughts."

Anya felt the pressure of his mind control on the outer limits of her mind and knew that she wasn't going to last long before he breached her defenses.

"You deserve nothing more than death." She screamed, closing her eyes and letting the last rays of hope to be lost to the infinite darkness. It would all be left to Eragon and Saphira now.

With one last spurt of her energy, she threw every last bit of her life force at Galbatorix and the last thing she remembered before bursting into flames was being happy that she didn't have to live alone without Verdos.

Then all she was aware of was pain and not being able to breathe. Her lungs were screaming for some sort of air, any air really. It felt like she was going to spontaneously combust any second… And then it was all over and she sucked sweet sweet air into her lungs.

But the mixture of air and smoke was too much and she began to wretch and throw up everything she had ever eaten in her entire life. It took her a while to calm down and when she finally looked around, she saw that she was in a forest. She was laying in the middle of a charred spot and there was even smoke coming from her clothes.

She did a quick body check to make sure that she was going to be o.k. and then did a quick weapon count as well. The 2 small blades that she always carried on her were still in the holster on her hip along with the sword and bow and arrows. She checked the smaller knife in her boots and was satisfied when it was there. At least she wasn't completely left to her own resources.

I can't believe we made it out of that alive. She laughed to herself but the laughter was cut short when there was no deep rumbling in an answer. She felt the beginning of panic and tried to reach out again but found nothing but her thoughts.

Anya had never felt so lonely in her entire life. It was like the silence of the whole world came crashing down on her in that moment and she screamed. She screamed as loud as her voice would go but the sound was lost to her ears because she was truly alone.

She laid there and cried, wishing that she could just continue to lay there until she decomposed into the earth. After what felt like hours and the sun was beginning to poke through the trees directly above her, she sat up and tried to form her thoughts about what she was going to do.

She got up to brush her pants off when something white caught her eye. She looked and for a second she couldn't bring her thoughts to believe what she was seeing. It was absolutely impossible.. And yet, here was a dragons egg, white as the clouds that were floating in the sky. She picked it up and felt the heat resonating from it already and Anya couldn't help the tears that were coming to her eyes as she remembered what it felt like when she had first held Verdos' egg in her hands. She pulled off her cloak and was starting to carefully wrap it up when another odd color caught her eye. On the other side of the clearing, there was another orange dragon egg.

How could this even be possible? Saphira was the last dragon egg. Wasn't she? Non-the-less Anya kneeled down and picked up the egg and wrapped it carefully with the other one. She had to get out of the Spine and get the eggs to Oromis as fast as she could. He would know what to do with them. There was absolutely no time to waste. And with a task set in mind, the aloneness faded a small amount.

A/N: Like many of my stories, this just came into my head the other day so I'm just going with it. Not really sure how far this is going to go so if you have suggestions feel free to send em my way. Well hope you enjoy and don't forget to review =)