Unfurling Black Wings

Abby Ebon

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Pairing; Murtagh x Harry Potter (Shruikan). Sort of, 'cause there isn't any physical sex while there are elephant-sized hints of more then friend-ship shaped 'affection'.

Disclaimer; I do not claim any work written or based off novels by Christopher Paolini or J. K. Rowling.

Note; I should have guessed 'playing' on the "Dragon Cave" site (click my eggs? They are located with links on my author page) would awaken my old love of dragons…this is partly to blame, I am sure, the rest of that happy inspiration came in a review and challenge for this pairing by Magician of the light. Much bowing, clapping, and singing of praise should be given; if not, well, you should know I'm miffed at you.

I'm not sure where this will go; I'm well versed in Harry Potter, but my Eragonstories number a grand total of…a three-ish number, kind-of. This will be the first Eragon story that wasn't written in some way for Chaos Silk. So…I hope no one has read Brisinger; as I have not…no telling, aye?

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Laid Still In Darkness

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He laid in the dark, his head upon his forearms, eyes closed, his tail tip flicked upward and down – a small movement; his only movement save his breathing. If he moved, he would have remembered the chains, for they would clank with thick metal and grate at the stone. He would have remembered all the painful little moments that had led him to being kept here; he would have remembered his hatred.

Instead he was still, so much so it was as if he was not alive. Some would call it sleep, but it was not that; for in sleep you thought, you remembered, you lived; it was his way of forgetting. Of dying a little at a time, he could live forever – the one who kept him (as if he was some pet…) gloated with reminding him of this whenever on a whim he was visited.

It had been many years since he had felt the painful death of the last of his likeness. He was alone. No other could understand him, no other could connect with him as he craved. Even killing his own kind had been preferable to the depth of silence that hushed his thoughts, that screamed with the wrongness of being so alone.

He knows, though, that there was a chance. A slender one; which hangs from a thread so tightly wound that it might snap before the chance unravels. He can do nothing, all the same. He is helpless, bound by magic, chained to a monster for likely the whole of his life. There is not other chance for him, if he dies – the monster might; if the monster would die…well, he would welcome his own death. As it was, the stillness of his mind was like a mirror, reflecting only what was looked at. It was in this way that he had survived his imprisonment, even his own self loathing at being treated as he was.

He wished he could have forgotten his name, like so many of his kind had. He had not, neither would he ever do so - for it had come with the terrible truth as his true name was revealed and used against him. He was Shruikan. He was Harry Potter; and he knew now a truth of what truly separated a witch and wizard from those they deemed ordinary, it was magic, the lifeblood of those born with the ability to use magic as they willed. They were magic, and magic, it turned out, was not only within them, but flesh and bone echoed with power they did not will, that happened, seemingly at the whim of magic itself.

Something so entwined with magic did not merely die when it ceased to breath. In some way it lived on, he was proof of this. Harry did not know if this was his world after so much change it could not be remembered as it had been, he could not stir up an idea of what had happened if that was a truth… or, only a different world that had always been the way he knew it to be, as he lived and breathed in it.

His chance for death – or a life longing for everlasting death – lay with three dragon eggs, he did not know what might emerge from those eggs that would be, perhaps, the last of his kind. Did not know if it would be Hermione, or Ron, or someone else he knew from his life before this one. He had thought perhaps they would remember him, if they – like he – knew their true names. Though that would not be any sort of kindness if they were born to be tied to the life of another – elf or human, it did not seem to matter.

He knew only that he had been manipulated to kill his own kind; that he was kept against his will; while the one with the power to do so lived on, tied forever with his own life. He had been turned into nothing more then a slave. He had no excuses. He wanted to die, but was not allowed.

So he would wait. He would bid his time until he met one of the little dragons and their hapless humans (or arrogant elves) and then he would tell them what he knew – all of what he had done, all that he might do if used as a weapon once more – and of the death that he longed for, then offer them the chance kill him. It was a coward's chance, when he had once been a hero. Some might think it a low way to go, he was what he was, after all – and that was magic.

That was power. That was why he was kept like a pet. His power and magic had been leached off him since he had not even come naturally into this world. He could not even say that he was a wizard anymore, for he had only enough magic in him to live that was all. That was what his master deemed enough to live.

He would rather pass on that title of hero then to be tied all his life with a tangled mind to one who sought only to kill those that might be a threat. Those of his kind and like that might have been friends, if he had only not been taken under the sway of the monster that called himself a Rider.

His chance lived on, still, in a little blue hatchling that had grown to be what Harry had aspired of her to be, he was proud of that little one. Her mind had touched his only once, she called herself Saphira, for he had warned her when she had hatched to tell no one of her true name (or the true name of her human) not even her Rider, who she loved and trusted in such a way he envied. She had grown older now, still as shinning and lovely as she had been at birth, though wary of him now, knowing what he was – one of the two, last of their kind, and knowing also that she must kill him or feel and see him die by another's hand; to see her Riders people free of the manipulations of his monster.

She had not yet accepted such a fate for him, thought he was between times amused and annoyed at her stubborn nature. Harry was reminded of Hermione – or Ginny – whenever he felt her mind press against his own; though he did not know – or think – that little Saphira could be either of them.

She had brought him interesting news, one day. She had revealed, filled with glee, that there was a third left; one who had been hidden since the time of the Wars, behind ancient wards. That one was Glaedr, of golden hide though the size of a small mountain. Harry had not bothered to seek out his mind, he feared what he would find – what this other would think of him, of what or who he could be – most of all he feared the strength of a mind like his own. Harry had only his mental power, if another as strong in presence of mind as himself put it to mind to change his ways of killing himself in this slow death; well, Harry did not know what might happen.

So he left Glaedr alone, and Saphira hand not mentioned him, as he had asked of her. He did not tell her everything, in hopes that she would doubt him and come to hate him in time so that he had some assurance he might die as he wanted. He had not told her of Thorn, the hatchling that shimmered like wet blood.

The littlest hatchling was young – though devoted to his human as he could be; he did not yet understand the tangled web that had been woven around them both as a trap. Harry had not been let near the hatchling – in fact, after his manipulator had found that Harry had done what he could to urge the magic not to let anything harm the egg or hatchling within with use of magic or force, he had been sealed away and left to rot at the base of mountains that burst from the land like piers.

Yet the hatchling knew of him, was in awe of him, and loathed the humans – even his own Rider – Harry did not know how such a thing had come to be. He was reminded of the fans he had had as the defeater of Voldemort. Thorn could be of their like, without knowing why he was the way he was. Some dragons had remembered feelings and connections without details – though they did not know why, exactly. Magic was vague, even to them.

Harry knew things were changing, for Thorn's little human - Murtagh - would be coming for a visit today; along with Harry's own hated manipulator, Galbatorix. All for lessons on how to bind a dragon to them; a useful lesson, for the likes of them. Harry did not know how Galbatorix had done it, so he used these chances to learn. Even while he pretended unaware in his stillness, Galbatorix did not know everything of his kin and kith, for Thorn – if he was allowed near (which he would never be) – would have known that he was as alive as he had always been, not merely in some magic replenishing sleep as was Galbatorix's little theory.

Harry felt the air change, a waft of a scent he had once thought imagined by poets. Air, outside – it was what he craved and longed for. What he was denied with his long imprisonment. He felt them near, coming as close as they dared – even as chained and burdened by magical leeches as Harry was, he was still physically intimidating, Galbatorix could not take that from him, though it was a irony.

He was starved, if any had bothered to care and look close, they would have seen that his skin clung close to bone and muscle, that his scales were dull of blood and shine of magic. That his wings were, while still useable, out of use and unlikely to lift him without great strain and possibly worse injury. Still, he was larger then any dragon alive – save, perhaps, Glaedr.

Being what he was, as a dragon, was impressive enough. Then he felt them move their power and minds against him, though they did not know it, by opening his mind – they opened their own minds to him. It was something that had taken years for Harry to find, this little loop of magical "logic".

He used it now, not to dig into the events Galbatorix planned and set into motion, but to find out about Murtagh. Saphira had known of this boy, and thought well of him until she and Eragon had faced him on the battle. Thorn thought him a worthy Rider, when the young dragon thought of him at all. It was odd that Thorn loathed humans, and when told what to do by Murtagh, loathed his own as well; other times though, Thorn thought of Murtagh fondly.

So Harry looked. He glimpsed into memories, of a boy beaten by an unkind father – one whose dragon Harry had fought beside, now both long dead – of a scar. Of a loathed birthright – a dragon's sword, stolen from the dead; the childish notion that this meant he would not be of use to a king that watched from afar.

Of the boy finding himself without father or mother, alone in a court that feared him and respected him in turn; of always knowing he was watched, though not even the king could know or control everything. Of the hope this knowledge brought.

Of the death of a friend, of the determination to build anew what had been corrupted over the ages – memories of finding a boy, a dragon, and a dying old man; suspicious of him until his last breath. Of an impossible journey over sand to reach people that the king disapproved of, rebels that fought for the old ways. Of a battle that brought about this boy kidnapping…the point of the battle, the boy learned to his sorrow only later.

The new life of his little dragon hatchling, of being manipulated by Galbatorix (though the boy only now recognized it as such) into getting his true name from his dragon; though not even the boy knew his dragons true name. This might have been by luck – though Harry knew it was his own doing at work.

Of a battle between blood brothers, of a sure certainty that both would life forever to serve a hated master; and they younger brothers shinning blue dragon would be violated by… Harry could not help but snort with surprise, as in Murtagh's mind was a surety that Galbatorix would have him – Harry/ Shruikan –mate with a hatchling not even a year old! It was ridiculous.

Harry opened one green eye (for Murtagh stood to one side of his head; Galbatorix the other); it looked into Murtagh as easily as the dark haired boy had looked into Shruikan and found only what he was meant to - the stillness of mind like a great sleeping lake. It was in Harry's eyes –eyes that had hid behind closed lids since the last dragon had died - that the truth was made clear. His eyes were still the alive, vibrant green that they had always been. Though, perhaps, now they were a bit dull with his wish of death and sickness of life.

Murtagh took a step back, his eyes wide with the realization that Harry was no more asleep or unaware as his own Thorn ever was. He was frightened, he would call out, and it was then that Harry spoke.

"I have not mated with any dragon in all my life. It is a great sorrow of Galbatorix…" His words came slowly, leaving his mind only for a moment before being taken into Murtagh's own mind, he was understood. So hungry was the boy for knowledge he did not realize his thoughts had stilled, his 'work' in magic ceased, and that would certainly be noticed; unless something was done.

Harry opened his other eye then, raised his head up slowly, so he looked down at the two Riders. His mouth gapped open in a wide yawn, tongue lolling and curling, showing off the sharpness of his teeth. It was then his gaze fixed on Galbatorix.

"I am hungry…"

Harry was not without his sense of humor.

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Note; this is passably just a snippet, just to see how you bite, rather; is this worth pursuing?

PS: whatever you may think, there will be NO SEX ! Though, yes, this is SLASH.

Sorta. Don't ask, alright? Gawd.