Chapter 1: First Rumblings
Thought was the first thing to return; he wondered what had happened. Feeling was the second thing; he had a headache. He opened his eyes, but could see only dancing spots of light. Whatever that bright light was, it had obviously been magic.
This worried him. Eragon only ever stayed in the foothills of the Spine Mountains. The main mountain range itself was greatly feared by the people in the village, and for good reason.
In the Spine, and a lot of other countryside besides, there were areas of magical...weirdness. Places where the natural order of the world was turned upside-down, sideways, back-to-front and every direction in between. People had been known to enter these areas and never come out, or come out a hundred year later hardly aged, or come back a day later and aged by fifty years. Those who returned spoke of strange sights, rivers flowing up hill, even walking trees with human heads as leaves. The vast majority of the people never went there. They stuck to the safe roads and places that had been scouted out and found to be safe.
Carefully, he crept over to the site of the blast, his heart thumping, ducking to the ground at every sudden sound. In a small crater lay a crystalline, blue stone; translucent and about a foot long. Crouching down, he picked up a stick and gave it a poke. It rolled slightly, but gave no reaction. Heartened by this, he touched it with his hand. It was smooth, almost slippery in texture and gave off a slight heat. Nothing happened. Picking it up, he looked around, to see if there had been any more explosions. He heard nothing, aside from a slight sound of returning birdsong as the surrounding wildlife recovered from its shock.
Eragon was a boy of direct thought. The appearance had been magical, but the stone itself obviously wasn't. With a little hesitation, he put it in his bag. As far as he could tell, it was a giant jewel, which would hopefully fetch a nice price with some of the foreign merchants down at the market. Confident in this belief though he was, he was not that brave. With his decision made, he beat a hasty retreat down the hill, being very careful not to be hit by any more magically appearing stones. The snares that he had laid earlier were completely forgotten.
Dawn slowly burned off the mist in the valley as he made his way back to the farm. Despite having caught nothing, he felt light and happy and whistled to himself as he walked. As he reached the farm he could see that his father and brother were already hard at work.
His family and two others shared a large piece of common ground, about a hundred yards square, at this end of the valley. It was good land, relatively flat, on a long shallow downhill. On three sides it was surrounded by woodland, with a trickling stream on the downhill side. A shallow ford allowed crossing to the lane on the far side.
The three families, the Garrows, Sloans and Harleys, named after their heads in true Palancar Valley fashion, formed a small community, helping each other out when needed. Half a dozen pigs, belonging to all three families were rooting around at the far end of the field, near the edge of the wood, watched by Harley's youngest son Reny. Old Harley was out with the plough and ox and Garrows' chickens were scratching around in the yard. Eragon's elder brother Roran was in the middle of the field, helping Sloan's oldest daughter Katrina again. This seemed odd to Eragon (who would want to spend time with a girl?), but he knew Roran and he reckoned that he was just trying to get friendly with Sloan by helping his daughter, so that Sloan would butcher one of his pigs for the midsummer festival.
Roran saw Eragon and waved cheerily. He looked very similar to Eragon, heavier in build and not quite as tall, but with similar colouration apart from his brown eyes. On a nobleman they would probably have been likened to chocolate or something else rich and expensive. Eragon thought they looked like mud, and in a spirit of brotherly affection, often said so.
Returning the greeting, Eragon ducked into their cottage. Dumping his stuff down by his bed in the loft, being careful to unstring his bow, he returned outside. By this time, Roran had run over.
"Good hunting trip was it?" He asked.
"It was brilliant. I caught a rabbit" Eragon said.
"Wow! A whole rabbit? You hear that father? Eragon slew a mighty beast! That's very impressive, especially since it must have been invisible. How did you see it?"
Eragon just looked at him. Roran laughed uproariously.
"Oh no! It's the Gonny-gonny death stare! My eyes are melting! Meltiiiing!"
Roran collapsed onto his back, kicked his legs and lay still, with his eyes closed. Eragon took the opportunity to dive on top of him and Roran's breath left him in a great "whoof!" He grabbed Eragon in a headlock and the two boys rolled around on the ground, wrestling with each other. It ended with Eragon still in a headlock and Roran knuckling his head mercilessly. They separated, both laughing now.
Garrow approached them, his balding head shining with sweat in the morning sun. "Morning Eragon," he said. "An empty trip then?"
"Not completely, father."Eragon replied.
He fetched out the blue stone he'd found, and told them the story of finding it. Garrow was worried.
"You're certain that nothing else happened?" He said.
"I didn't see anything. There was just a flash and it appeared." Eragon said.
"It might not have been from the Spine. Might there have been a mage around there and you just didn't see him?"
"I suppose," Eragon said. "But I left pretty quickly and covered my tracks well. And anyway, we haven't seen a mage up this end of the Empire for years, and I bet they've got better things to do than follow me on a hunting trip."
"Do you really want to risk it? You know what happened to that man down in Palancar a few years ago who was accused of stealing from them."
Eragon hadn't been born then, but Roran had, on a rare trip to the city, and even now, twenty years later, he still winced at the memory. The sight of a man being chained to a post and then methodically turned inside out while he screamed in agony would do that to you.
Roran said: "I agree with Eragon father. There aren't many mages around. It's far more likely to be something strange from the Spine."
"Good," said Eragon. "In that case, I'll take it down to the village tomorrow and sell it."
"Eragon," Roran said. "How many stones like this do you think there are? The merchants will quite happily buy things they know to be worth something, like our produce, or gold or whatever, but they aren't going to buy a blue, egg-shaped lump of crystal. Who would be interested in such a thing? Could you see Lady Palancar wearing it in a necklace, perhaps?"
The image of the tall, thin liege lady with a foot-long blue stone hanging from her neck made Eragon grin to himself.
"Can I keep it then?" He said.
"Are you absolutely sure that there was no-one around?" Garrow asked in a tone of voice that showed the importance of the question.
Eragon met his gaze evenly. "I'm sure."
"In that case, then you may keep it" said Garrow. "Put it inside, then let's get back to work."
As Eragon turned away, Garrow had a sudden thought and called him back. "Eragon, I want you to stop hunting for a while."
Eragon's heart sank. "Why?"
"If it wasn't a mage, then it was the Spine. It could be nothing, or it could be that it is spreading."
"But then where will we get meat?"
Garrow's expression softened "Eragon, I'd rather live on vegetables and pottage forever than lose my son in the Spine. You can hunt around here, but I don't want you going into the hills. Now get on with you."
Sullenly, Eragon agreed and turned back towards the cottage. He didn't like it, but he could see his father's point.
He took the stone inside, feeling very annoyed with the whole world. His plan to sell the stone had been rejected and now he couldn't hunt in the mountains. As far as the stone was concerned, he would just take it down to the market in a day or so and try and get something for it anyway; he'd not actually been specifically forbidden to go. At least he could still hunt; he'd just have to see what the surrounding woods had to offer in terms of game. He placed the stone next to the straw filled sack on his sleeping pallet that served him as a pillow. Then he went to join his family at work in the morning sun.
Tap-tap, tap-tap. It was night and Eragon felt himself dragged from sleep by the strange sound. In his sleep addled state, he thought at first that someone might be breaking into the cottage, before it occurred to him that no-one would try to chip through a wall when they could just break the door down. Groggily, he felt around in the dark for the source of the sound until his hands fell on the stone. The chipping sound was coming from inside it; he could felt the vibrations. Hoping that the sound wouldn't wake the others, he picked it up and slipped down the ladder from the loft where he and his brother slept. Creeping past his father, who slept in the main cottage, he took it outside, past the two pigs which slept at the opposite end.
Outside was a full moon, which seemed unusually bright to Eragon's eyes. He could clearly see the dark silhouette of the chicken coop next to the cottage.
The sound continued, seeming to get louder as it did. Moving a short distance away from the cottage, he heard the sound of a badger sniffing around the back. He placed the stone on the ground, and saw it wobble in time to the taps. A small chip flew out from the surface, glittering in the moonlight and Eragon turned and grabbed a hoe that was in the lean-to next to the cottage. Whatever it was, he wanted to be ready. As he turned back, he saw cracks appear from the hole and spread round the surface of the stone. Then, with one crack, the stone shattered.
Lying in the wreckage was a lizard! It was about two feet long, half of which was tail. Eragon poised himself, holding the hoe in a fair imitation of the way he'd seen staff fighters do it in the village once. The lizard just lay there, as if it was dead. Feeling bolder, Eragon poked it with the hoe. There was no response, although Eragon could its sides moving as it breathed. It was evidently alive. Feeling bolder still, he reached out his left hand to touch it.
What happened next could be accurately described as a life-changing moment. As his finger made contact with the lizard, there was a flash of blinding light. It felt almost physical to Eragon, as if it had reached through his eyes and started shaking his brain around. At the same time, there was a terrible agony in his hand. It was almost unbearable, would have been, if not for the fact that it ended almost as soon as it began. Eragon felt darkness prick around the edge of his vision and felt himself fall and hit the floor. With a supreme effort of will, he managed to prevent himself from losing consciousness. Raising his head, he looked at the lizard. A tingle shivered its way down his spine as fear tickled him. Shaking off a wave of dizziness, he scrambled to his feet and picked up the hoe where it had fallen, pointing it at the beast as if to ward off a demon.
She was on her feet now, no longer exhausted. He could see her clearly, and trembled at what he saw. Her length was close to two and a half feet, of which just under a foot was tail. The last third of the tail was itself divided into three, with folds of skin between them. It whipped and flared around as she tried to maintain balance. She stood on all four legs and regarded him with a six inch long head that bore a resemblance to an angular, reptilian horse. What scared Eragon were the two additional limbs that protruded from around her shoulders, a little like the underdeveloped wings of a chick. Eragon knew of only one lizard that had wings.
"A dragon!" Eragon jumped backwards, away from the beast. "A dragon!" At the sound of his half-shouted exclamation, the creature turned and leapt at him. The shock knocked him flat again and she stood on his chest; her weight pressing on his breastbone. His right hand was trapped under the hoe; in desperation, he tried to shove her off with his still-throbbing left hand. This time there was no flash, but she turned and bit at it. As hot breath washed over his face, he knew that he was going to die. He closed his eyes.
The next thing he knew, his face was being enthusiastically licked. It was an experience roughly akin to being rubbed with hot, wet sandpaper. "Hey! Get off!" He managed to free his right hand and used them both to lift her off. This time she did not resist and sat down on her haunches as he sat up. Wiping off his face with his sleeve he studied her. Her behaviour ran counter to everything he'd ever been taught.
Dragons were the inhabitants of legend, great fire-breathing and flying lizards. Tales abounded of the Dragon Riders, men and women of great power, who rode the mighty beasts. They were the stuff of fear, of tales to scare children. Eragon had grown up listening to stories of Brom the Bloody-handed and Saphira; of Draugnir Terrorflame the dragon and Morzan of the Seven Skulls, his Rider.
Dragons were supposed to be creatures of fear, immolating men with their flames. He held out his left hand and she nuzzled it; they were not supposed to act like this.
He got up, walked a little way and crouched down again, facing her. She watched him, not moving. He held out his hand and she came trotting over. Eragon remembered a cat that had lived in the village years ago, which had behaved in a similar fashion.
"But if dragons behave like cats, then you're just an animal like any other," he said.
The tension in his muscles relaxed. He felt relieved. She was still following him around like a baby bird, creatures which tended to think that whatever creature they saw first was their mother. However, now he had a problem.
"What am I going to do with you? I can't let Father or Roran see you; they were worried enough about a weird stone. If I tell them that it was actually an egg and they see you, neither of our lives will be worth living."
Other problems occurred to him as well. What did she eat? How much? He sat and thought about it for a bit, then turned as he heard a rustling sound near the base of the chicken coop. With a bound the dragon was off, bounding towards the sound. Eragon heard a muffled squeak, and then she returned, a dead rat held in her jaws.
Eragon smiled. "That solves that problem then." Looking to the east, he noticed the eastern sky beginning to lighten.
"I'll take you hunting. We'll see if you like rabbit as well. Just wait here." He crept into the cottage to grab his equipment and returned. The dragon hadn't moved.
Arana opened her eyes and wished she could go back to sleep. Her entire body burned with pain. She was currently tied across the back of a horse, but from the feeling in her back she'd evidently been dragged along the ground for a good distance first. Even the impacts from the raindrops that pelted down from the sky felt like stings. Her entire body ached from the beating that she'd received. One of her legs was broken; she could feel the bone rub as the movements of the horse jerked it around. Jolts of pain shot up her leg every time.
She craned her neck and through the rain thought that she could see soldiers. Whoever the mage was, he was still around as the raindrops stopped a foot or two above their heads. Only Arana, at the back, was unprotected. She felt hunger and thirst knawing at her. How long had it been since she'd last eaten? She licked at the water running down her face. It helped, somewhat. Every bad side has its upside. She held onto that thought. She would need every shred of optimism and strength that she could muster for the coming trial.
