Author's Note:
Later may contain lemons. (I guess Chapter 20 is quite like that.) I love reviews, but I won't beg (er, not yet). I don't even mind flames. My grammar is said to be improving during the story, but I must admit I'm not even close to a native English speaker with my two years for I have been learning it.
The chapters are written in different POVs, every chapter portraying one particular person (usually). Don't forget that what they think, think to know and feel are not necessarily true. Those are only their opinions.
Also, I discovered that at one particular part many readers… stop reading it. Well, let me say, I love cheating my readers, so read further…
Set after Brisingr.
Disclaimer: I do not own the Inheritance Cycle, the names, the characters, the style (etc.) of it or any relating rights, Christopher Paolini does. I own only the general idea of the story and some of the characters. The following story is a fanfiction based on Christopher Paolini's books and is only for the entertainment of both me and my occasional readers. Do not copy without my permission (if you should want to - lol).
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book one
Manin! Wyrda! Hugin!
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Prologue
It was nearly midnight. The pale moon hid behind the thick clouds which covered the sky. It was dark and silent as nobody dared to bother the king's sleep with any noise. The servants slept deeply in their chambers, trying to escape from reality for as much time as they were able to. It was somehow not the same like other nights – there was the sense of fate in the air. The guards were standing on their places nervously, shivering with the cold of the blowing wind. It shook the leaves of the trees and bushes as if some enemy warrior had been hiding behind it.
The Varden got - as far as it was gossiped – closer and closer to Uru'baen by every hour. With Galbatorix and his dragon, Shruikan in the castle, the soldiers had no fears about the outcome of a confrontation with the rebels. But if the traitors decide to assault, somebody – a guard, obviously – will have to notice them, before notifying the danger the king and his dragon. So the guards, who were bad-lucky enough to be on duty tonight, stared anxiously at the darkness. They weren't the ones who should have feared – nothing and nobody was moving tonight around or inside the castle.
Except one person.
The little girl was going down the stairs which had been built for the servants very long ago not much after the elves' time. In one of her hands she held a lamp, in the other she clutched a sword. The blade was too big for the black-haired girl, who seemed to be no more than twelve years old. Her face was childishly round and soft, but she wore such an expression on it that would have better fit an adult. Her eyes were deep blue and especially exquisite although she stared the steps like she would have been going to kill somebody. Which was exactly the case.
She stopped for a moment to look around. She was almost at the half of the narrow servant corridor, about 800 yards deep under the ground of Uru'baen. I have to hurry if I'd like to make it back before sunrise, the girl thought. It was only hypothetical, of course. The 'plan' was just an excuse; she had no real chance to fulfil it. If not the guards, then the wards – either way she would be dead. It's just matter of hours. But first, she had to get down. She took a deep breathe and stepped down in the direction of the secret chamber.
To take courage, she thought of her beloved horse dying of the poison. She could guess that it may have been one of the servants who poisoned him, envying her her uncle and grandfather. It was since then that she called servant every follower of Galbatorix. She remembered once more the words of her true uncle:
If you are forced to serve Galbatorix, and can't tear the bond, you should kill yourself, or let us kill you – for the hope of a better world. Or something like that. Her not-so-true uncle was just laughing at the thought of being suicide when he told her His words and so was she – then. But she had been considering it a lot recently. Not only His words but also His actions made her think more deeply about war and peace, life and death, and mainly, about fate. Once it had come the day, when she wanted to follow only Him, and had thought of Him all day long. She desperately longed for hearing His words with her own ears, for be with Him, for see His blue dragon…
But there hadn't been any chance to this, and probably never would be.
I'm such a coward, she thought, as she caught the sight of light down, at the end of the servant's corridor, in front of the secret chamber of Galbatorix's most precious treasure. A few steps and she would stand face to face with many well-trained soldiers. She sighed - you see, you could just have a sword or anything sharp, and by now you would be totally dead. But she simply couldn't commit the suicide. After she talked to Murtagh and he told her the old elf and his dragon's death, she decided. She couldn't bear any more aggression and murder.
She wanted to die because she couldn't just simply walk out of Uru'baen – the king knew her true name too, and although she wasn't bound as strongly as her not-so-true uncle and his dragon, she couldn't become a traitor or do anything a real traitor would do. If she didn't do something unforgivable, she would just have been bound stronger. Her grandfather's name didn't count anything as her grandmother had been only a simple attendant and had given birth to a girl, but it would have been enough to consider her execution twice as carefully.
If there is a way to get free of Galbatorix, to change my true name (if it is possible as my true uncle claims) then the fulfilling of this crazy plan will have to do. She had come to this conclusion four days ago when she had perfected 'The Great Anti-Galbatorix Plan' – and tonight she had decided to end her life as the king's servant. Fate would decide whether she could start a new one… or not. She didn't honestly believe in option one.
One more step… She reached the hall with the soldiers. Deep breathe… Relax… It'll be over in ten minutes anyways. She prayed the guards to be efficient enough and kill her fast. Dying painfully for a long time was not really attractive for her. Coward! Step down!
The guards stood nervously in the hall with the steel door. They didn't even know what they were protecting, but had a guess that it was more preferable so. Whatever thing was hidden under the castle, behind the steel door, it should have stayed there without their know.
The king's personal rooms were exactly above the secret chamber, yards high. Some days the king came down personally, every time in other hours – the guards never had known when he came to visit next, so they couldn't relax any time. Not that they would be able to. All of them hated to be here. After a time every soldier had got crazy: they heard strange voices whispering in their head. Nobody who served here was able to free himself from the voices' power again and live his life normally afterwards.
There were some torches on the walls and painted trembling shadows on the floor. The guards held one hand on their sword-hilt, although there was no sign of danger, as always. As the night passed so became they more and more nervous. The whisper (Was there really any voice in the air? Or just in their head?) never stopped, never ended. It wasn't loud, but held the sense of dark magic and power in it. They had got quite used to it – as much as they could -, so they did find nothing suspicious on the sound of footsteps. But this time, the sound was not in their head, it came from the direction of the narrow stairs.
The soldiers thought their eyes were deceiving them when they caught the glimpse of a young girl with wide blue eyes. The girl was wearing a sweet long black skirt, but held a sword in her hand. Her hair fell in curls round her heart-shaped face. Her skin was smooth alabaster. It was such an impossible image, the soldiers couldn't believe her to be just an innocent human girl whom she seemed.
She must be some evil magical creature like the laughing men. She doesn't seem dangerous, so we have to be even more cautious with her. She may be a very old witch or an elf or something like that, in the service of Galbatorix. You can see on her face that she can use magic perfectly… - the leader of the soldiers thought. But aloud he just said:
„Good evening, ma'am, how can we help you? Are you here to go into the chamber?"
The girl was so surprised at these welcoming words that she stopped and just frowned. She hadn't expected anything like this. The soldiers misunderstood her again and thought her to be offended as they didn't recognize her.
„I'm so sorry, it's such a bad light here downstairs, we didn't see you well… er… my lady." another soldier continued quickly.
„As I can now clearly see, you have a pass so we can open you the chamber." the leader hurried to make amends for his fault. He waited, but she didn't answer. "If you want so?" It sounded rather a question now.
„I want so." she finally managed to spit out. It was now too late that she realized, she was still wearing the pass she stole in order to get into Murtagh's rooms and question him about the gossips of the old Dragon Rider. The guards hurried to the steel door. The leader got out a key ring of his pocket and gave it to her. This was so strange that the girl couldn't help but ask:
„How can this be in your pocket and not in the king's?" as soon as she finished, she realized how uninformed she could seem now. She was about to correct her mistake, but for her surprise, the leader man suddenly blushed.
„His majesty forgot it the last time he was here, and I… I forgot as well to… to get him back…" he stuttered.
„Oh" she answered intelligently.
She held the key ring and opened lock after lock. The soldiers tactfully retreated to the hall's back wall. The key ring had fourteen strange-shaped key on it. It would have been impossible to copy their difficult patterns. The task was very easy: every lock had a name above it, and every key had a different colour.
As every Forsworn's dragon had had a different colour. Her education was not too comprehensive, but this was a thing she was taught to very well. When she paired the first six, she could open the steel door.
On the other side there was a chamber. All around the wall there were the names of the „missing" Forsworn: three on either side of the octagonal room and one more. She went round, pairing the six keys. Opposite the door she came in through there was another one. Her heart gave a leap when she discovered the name „Morzan" above its hole. Her hand trembled as she picked out the ruby key. Now all the locks were opened.
She could hear her heartbeat noisily throbbing in her ears. She heard another sound through it – whispering voices. The young girl took a deep breathe and opened the door of the chamber in which the third dragon egg was hidden.
„Eragon, I do this for You…"
To be continued...
Author's Note: I hope you enjoyed. Review if you should feel like so.
Amiréa
