The Tale of Nogare
"Nogare, I have a proposition for you," said Galbatorix, the King of the Empire.
"A proposition? Isn't that a participle of a sentence?"
"Don't get smart with me, boy. I want you to take you dragon Ruberia and go to Tierm. There I wish you to speak to the merchant Yavuu, and convince him to let his daughter come here to my palace."
Nogare stared at the King. "How am I suppose to persuade a lowlife vendor to surrender his daughter?"
"Tell him I wish to marry her or something. I don't care how. All I care is that it gets done."
Galbatorix left the room. Nogare contacted his dragon. Ruberia? We have a mission to do.
I'm with you, Nogare. I'll be up in the dragon's nest in an hour. I found a nice juicy antelope and I have to let it digest.
Fine, one hour, no later.
Nogare packed his bag for the short trip and walked up the long staircase to the dragon's nest near the crest of the Palace. He got the saddle ready, and when Ruberia, her red scales glimmering in the moonlight, landed, he fastened the saddle to her back and climbed on.
It took four days to get to Tierm. Nogare, who bore the King's seal, arrived within fifteen minutes of the time when the gate would be closed and no one would be able to enter the city until morning. Ruberia waited outside, for people would die of fright if they saw a dragon, especially this dragon, who with Nogare and fourteen soldiers demolished the entire city of Botswin. The Empire passed out fliers saying that anyone who spoke of the raid of Botswin was talking folderol, for neither the raid nor Botswin ever existed. Yet people knew that this was a lie, and the crimson dragon could harm them again if ordered to do so.
Nogare held an aura of fear himself, but bit so much as the dragon. Being handsome, many fathers in the Empire wanted their daughters to become Nogare's bride, but so far he had shown no attraction for anyone.
"Excuse me, foul subject of the King," Nogare said, stopping a terrified passerby, "but can you direct me to the home of the merchant Yavuu?"
"Y-yavuu? Take a right, then a left, then a right, then turn diagonally, then kill your dragon!" The passerby said. Nogare picked him up as though he were a leaf and tossed him on the ground hard. Then he pulled out a sword, ripped off the garments covering the man's chest, and carved a triangle with the sword.
"Don't you ever mock Ruberia like that again!" Nogare shouted, as blood dripped from the slash marks on the man's abdomen.
People standing about gasped in horror as they witnessed these proceedings. The man who had just suffered was a respectful merchant named Jeod, whose goods were sold overseas. Some of his supplies went to Surda, that recalcitrant nation that seceded itself from the Empire.
"Now, if you subjects fail to direct me to the house of Yavuu, I will convince Galbatorix to declare the town of Tierm 'Untouchable.' And you don't want me to do that."
Nogare was right; the people of Tierm certainly had no wish to bear the stigma of being called "untouchable." Untouchables could not marry, and could not advance their station. They were prevented from getting an education, and an Untouchable who knew how to read and write was locked in a cell for twenty years with no books, scrolls, or even political pamphlets to keep him company. He would only be set free when it could be proven that he had lost his literacy. If he never loses it, he'd just perish in the Penitentiary.
A woman spoke loudly about seven feet away from Nogare. "Yavuu lives on 74 Elm Takkers Avenue!"
"Thank you," Nogare said. "If this information proves false, though, I will have to make my threats a reality. Good day."
Nogare went towards Elm Takkers Avenue. It looked more like an army barracks than a set of houses. At number 74, he knocked on the door.
A middle-aged man opened it.
"Are you Yavuu?" Nogare asked.
"I might be. What do you want?"
"Do not ask what I want. Ask what the Empire wants."
"Fine, what does the Empire wish?"
"These are matters that we cannot discuss on the street, Yavuu. Prying ears, you know."
The merchant sighed. "Come in, then."
Once the door was safely fastened, Nogare turned to Yavuu. "Galbatorix wants your daughter."
"What?"
"Your daughter. The King wants her."
"I heard you, but you ask for the one thing I cannot give. What does he want her for, anyhow?"
"Marriage."
The merchant stared at Nogare. "That's preposterous! The King is so old, older than me, older than my grandfather! He can't wed Killia!"
"I would advise you not to ridicule the King's geriatric engenders," Nogare said coldly.
"Oh, you misunderstand me. I don't mean—I just meant—look, Killia is only twenty-three! She needs someone her own age."
"Galbatorix may be four times that, but he still looks quite young. It is the effect of being a Rider, you know. In physiognomy, he might as well be twenty-six."
"I savvy not your big words. But Killia's in love already."
"The King will not care. He is above the need to have a wife who loves him. That is for losers and no-accounts."
"I can't force her to marry a man she doesn't love!"
"It's not you who are forcing her, but Galbatorix. And it is the responsibility of everyone in the Empire to bow down to his will, no questions asked."
"Yes, but—"
At that moment, a young woman entered the room from the side opposite the door. She had red hair and eyebrows, and wore a black-and-white kimono. "Father, who is 't that is visiting?" She did not see Nogare's face for he was standing in the shadows. He stepped forward so that she could see, and her mug became a deep shade of violet.
"As you can see, it is the King's choirboy," said Yavuu.
"Choirboy? What a derogatory term!" Nogare was surprised that this expression came not from his own mouth but from Killia's. "To think that you could liken someone so noble to a chimp—how horrendous!"
Choirboy was the name of a chimpanzee in Gil'ead, who had been trained to perform tricks such as balancing a beach ball on his head and taking twenty paces forward. He would do anything for a banana, an orange, and Doublemint Bubble Gum, the latter which sadly did not exist in all of Algaesia, but only Choirboy's imagination.
Yavuu stared at his daughter. She had never contradicted him before.
"So, what you here for?" Killia asked Nogare.
"You," he said simply.
She swooned. Yavuu rushed to her, slapping her face over and over. But she wouldn't respond.
"You killed my daughter!" Yavuu said.
"Have you no smelling salts?" Nogare inquired. "They would revive her in a jiffy."
"No, I have no smelling salts. Nobody in my family has ever fainted before now!"
"Well, that's an achievement, in of itself, I guess," Nogare muttered. "But I'll take her with me to the King's Palace, where there's bound to be smelling salts aplenty."
"Are you mad? I'm not letting my daughter be revived by the King's medics so that she can be come the King's bride and provide the King's children!"
"If I were not under orders to fetch this maiden, I would arrest you for high treason and insubordination to the Empire." Nogare lifted the unconscious form of Killia in his arms, ignoring Yavuu's desperate attempts to pry his daughter free. "Stand aside, old fool, or I'll have your head on a silver platter."
Yavuu knew that these threats would be carried out. He desisted reluctantly, and watched as his precious daughter was snatched from him right under his nose.