An Important Discovery

Eragon was bored. He wasn't bored of the beautiful landscape, stretching out languidly for miles around, the Hadarac Desert a vague memory to the left of his eye line, hazy from the distant sandy puffs he could see swirling in the distance, and the two rivers, elegant blue snakes that slithered across the landscape in such an elegant fashion he was reminded of how Arya's dress hung over her lithe body...

He shook his head wildly, forbidding himself of such thoughts of her, and settled himself more rigidly upon the chair he was sitting in, snatching his eyes away from the rivers, and turned back to his room in Hedarth, given to him by the dwarves in gratitude for his service to his adopted clan. It was clean and spacious, with a bed beside the window covered in soft linen sheets and a desk which he sat at which was carved out of acacia wood with simple but interesting patterns. There were also various fairths upon the wall, depicting various scenes that resided in the great halls of his memory and others, but he had looked at them too many times to be interested in them. He saw his sword in its scabbard upon the bed, but he had practised so much already that day he was beginning to get tired of giving people bruises for no clear gain. Even the books left on his desk offered no attraction for him.

Therefore, he wallowed in the pit of boredom for nearly an hour, almost talking to himself to placate it, yet preventing himself for actually doing so, fearing that he was becoming mad, and hastily stood up, deciding that he had confined himself in his room for too long, and set off to find Orik, who was meant to be arriving in the city that day for a royal visit.

Eragon found him in the courtyard with a curious device that was about the same size as a pocket, and was sliding his fingers along it, laughing. Fearing that his friend had gone mad, Eragon approached him cautiously, wishing that someone, such as Nasuada, was here to defuse the situation. He took a deep breath, and cried, "Orik, what are you doing?"

Orik looked up with a grin, "Was Oromis not throughout with your education, Eragon? This is an I-touch, and it was brought to these lands by Gûntera himself for dwarves to communicate with each other should our light systems break down, and various other useful things. I was facebooking Nar Garzhvog because I didn't know he enjoyed Oromis and Vrael slash fan fictions as well!"

What? "What are you talking about, Orik? How on earth does this..." He squinted at the gleaming instrument, "Shiny bar of soap that changes colours like the sky, make you do such things? What on earth is slash? And why are you booking an Urgal's face?!" He began to wish he was bored again, which was preferable to watching his friend slowly go insane, and taking him with him.

Orik roared with laughter, "It's an I-touch, lad, but that's pretty much the only difference, as you can get much rinsed on this! The amount of slash you can get on here...! Slash is when you pair two same sex characters and put them through much angst so they can be together." Eragon felt sick as he imagined his former master and the former leader of the Riders together...then a malicious thought occurred to him that it could have happened, "And Facebook is this brilliant application on here where you can talk to people and see their fairths. Arya is on it at the moment, if you wish to say hello...wow, she has new ones of you two during the battle against the King! She even got one of Murtagh!"

Eragon was suddenly very interested, all his caution and repulsion blasted away, "Yes please!" He crowed.

Orik chuckled, "that's the way lad; I thought you would like it! We shall have to set up an account for you..."

"An account?"

"Oh, like a post where you give and receive messages from. Here, type in your name, age and occupation...yeah, you type like this. You have to use the Ancient Language on here, because it means you're telling the truth and you know whether someone just wants to talk to you or get your jerkin off for some sumptuous fairth for their friends to ogle at." At Eragon's expression, he shrugged and said, "Hey, it happens."

Eragon grimaced, and typed out,

Names: Eragon Bromsson/Shadeslayer/Firesword

Age: 17 (I think...)

Lives: ...I don't know!

Occupation: Dragon Rider Elder

About Me:

"Erm...Orik, what I am meant to put here? Am I meant to write about what I have beside me, what I have done, or who I am?"

Orik laughed, "Don't bother with that one; no one ever reads it anyway."

"Really?" When the dwarf nodded, Eragon relaxed, and filled in the rest of the boxes,

Societies: Varden
Brothers/sisters: (Eragon swore under his breath) Murtagh

"Well, that took a while." Eragon wiped his forehead, having finally filled out his profile, staring at the mass of writing, "So how do I put a fairth up?"

"Easy!" Orik picked up the device and held it up at Eragon, which made Eragon instinctively, after months of being ambushed, raise his arms to his face, which made the dwarf snigger, "Eragon, why would I want to kill you with this? What I need you to do is to find your favourite memory and turn it into a fairth for the device. Go on, try it!"

Eragon hesitated, feeling like a deer surrounded by a pack of unseen wolves, then he reluctantly delved in his memories, sifting through them. He supposed that he could have the one where he had killed Galbatorix, when he was flying high above the clouds with Saphira, sitting with Oromis in his hut, talking with Arya in his tent after the battle...but he found that he didn't like them; they were too obvious. Then he suddenly grinned when he found the one he wanted, and concentrated on it. The man's face was a picture of pleasurable confusion, like a victim being pulled out of suffocating rubble, the unluckiest victim in all Alagaësia, enslaved from the moment he was conceived, and almost the day he died.

Of course, it was Murtagh. He was being supported by Eragon and he limped across the desolate landscape, littered with fallen men like petals being scattered like blossoms in the wind, knocked off the tree with seemingly no effort at all. Eragon knew that he would be murdered in his sleep by his half brother if he ever found out, but Eragon persisted, partially because his hair looked half decent in it.

Orik raised his eyebrow when it appeared on the device, "Are you sure you want this picture? Nasuada will be furious, as well as most of the Varden."

"Yes. And she'll only be angry because she's jealous of how close I was."

"Aye. That's true." A twinkle appeared in his eyes, "He hasn't asked her, then?"
Eragon shook his head, "Don't think so."

"We can check!" Orik stroked the device a few times, and laughed, "No, he hasn't."

Eragon was interested, "How do you know that?"

"On your profile, you can put whether you are single or have a lover or spouse. It has been expanded for you, Eragon, so you can mention that you're joined up to Saphira."

Eragon's mind reeled, "Don't tell me she's on there too...?"

"Oh, she's on Fangbook. But you can link up to her easily, don't worry."

Eragon shook his head, "I need to sit down, even though that's all I have been doing today until now."

Orik stroked the device again, "Hey Eragon," He ventured, "Fancy taking 'Are you susceptible to becoming a Shade' quiz?"

Eragon snorted, "I feel disturbed enough to be one. I'll do it." He snatched the device off Orik, and began to ruthlessly do it. He swore loudly when he saw the result.