Chapter 3

Letters to Brom

The sky was clouded over that morning, and it looked as though it would snow later in the day, or even storm according to one woman with bad joints. There was no snow on the ground now, but the earth was so frozen that it was hard and unyielding as stone, and any liquid left outside would freeze within a few minutes.

Eragon was used to cold, having experienced much colder than this when astride Saphira, flying above the clouds. The thought of Saphira made him choke, but he swallowed the lump in his throat and stepped forward to Brom's door, feeling a little odd being there.

"Roran…this is between Brom and I." He said softly, barely glancing over his shoulder to look at his cousin. Roran frowned but nodded.

"I'll be at Morn's, then. Don't do anything stupid, cousin." Eragon's lip twitched in a smile and he waited until Roran had turned before he knocked on the door.

It swung open, not being fully closed. Eragon glanced back at his cousin's retreating figure, then pushed the door open more and slipped inside, closing it behind him.

It was dark inside, and far colder than an occupied house would normally have been; the stove was out, and there was ice frozen on the inside of the window where there had been a leak. "Brom?" Eragon called out.

The parchment that still filled the room absorbed his voice, leaving it sound dull.

"Brom, are you home?" Eragon asked, more loudly. Still no answer, and Eragon stepped forwards deeper into the small home; there seemed something odd about the way things looked. He remembered what Brom's home had looked like before he had left the valley so long ago…or, as he would have…and something seemed off.

Books. There were fewer of them than he had seen before; where they had once been stacked, now a few lay open with bits of scrap stuck into the pages to hold them open for reading, and there were far fewer. A bit of loose clothing was scattered here and there, and a half-packed bag hung by its single threadbare strap on the wall near the door.

Brom must have been gone for at least a day, and he left his home unexpectedly.

"This doesn't bode well…" Eragon thought grimly; few things could put the storyteller in such a rush that he'd leave his home wide open and with all his belongings scattered. Either it was a matter of the greatest urgency, or he….had been made to leave by force. "No, this doesn't bode well at all…"

Eragon crept around a small pile of what seemed to be rags, peering around for any sign of where Brom had gone; details were something he had been taught to look for by the elves. Surely he could pick up something…

"Didn't think it would be easy, did you?"

Eragon jumped, scattering parchment as he stumbled to the floor, scrambling to his back and looking towards the door; a man was leaning against the now-open doorframe. He was old, and balding, but certainly not Brom; this man had sharp features and mottled skin, pale in places and red in others. He seemed to shake slightly where he stood, and took a drink from a small metal flask.

"I-…I'm sorry, who are you?"

The man smiled; he had not a single tooth in his mouth. "Names are powerful things, boy."

Eragon narrowed his eyes. 'What's he mean? Strange old man…'

"And you're an strange young boy," the human said instantly, straightening his grey tunic in indignation.

"How did you-?"

"Read your thoughts?" he interjected. He paused to take another sip from the flask, clearing his throat noisily. "Because I can. No better explanation. I assume you're here for Brom?"

"Where is he?" Eragon scrambled to his feet, brushing dust from his clothes. "I must speak with him, it's very urg-"

"He's gone," the man interrupted again, not bothering to close the door as he walked inside. "…gone for a week, I imagine. He left rather quick when I delivered those letters to him."

Eragon thought for a moment, stepping back from the man; he didn't want to get too close…he just didn't trust the old geezer. Anyone that could read another's mind was to be respected, if not feared; without his magic he was blind to such things. No amount of training could unlock a door that was no longer there.

"You must be….Eragon, is it?" the man asked, narrowing his tired grey eyes and looking him over thoughtfully. "…not very impressive, considering what Brom said of you."

"He…what did he say about me?"

"Said you were an outstanding young man, is what," the old man said quietly, turning away. He snorted. "You're a child. That cannot change. But no matter…Brom is not here, and you shouldn't be either."

"And you? Who are you? Why are you here?"

The man had been making to leave, but turned back and glared at Eragon. "I? I am here to cheat."

"To…to cheat?"

"Yes, to cheat," the old man repeated, confusing Eragon even further as he began to walk out of the door. He stopped just outside, peering around as a light snow began to fall before he took another sip from the silvery flask. "To accidentally leave information I'm not supposed to, tottering old fool that I am."

By now Eragon was simply confused instead of suspicious, but his eyes widened as the old man spun around with remarkable agility, throwing something at Eragon. He instinctively ducked as he saw a flash of silver light, and a metallic pinging sounded from behind him.

"What are you doing?"

"What do you think I'm doing?" the man growled, retreating from the door. "…I'm giving you a push in the right direction."

Eragon was about to leap up to tackle the old man, but instead found him already in the road, walking swiftly away. "What…?" he gasped. "…what was all that? What did he..?" Eragon turned around, sweeping his gaze around the room until he spotted what had been thrown at him; the metal flask the man had been drinking from, now empty. Eragon glanced over his shoulder before warily approaching it.

It was an unimpressive little container; the metal that made it was scratched on the outside but gleamed nevertheless, and the lid was made of some kind of cork attached by a leather thong running from a loop of metal on the side.

Eragon reached down to pick it up, almost dropping it when he felt the surface; it was very warm from the man's hands. He barely trusted the man, but he seemed to know something of both him and Brom, and the only way he would receive any answers was to figure out what he had meant by 'cheating'.

Engraved on the side of the flask was a line of script, in the ancient language no less. Eragon blinked in surprise and looked it over; he could still read. "Good rum is a tale of its own," he read. It seemed to be a message either to the old man from himself or a friend; maybe they had had rum together, or the man was reminding himself that his drink was a good one.

Or something. Obviously the man liked his drink, because the flask was completely empty now.

What was Eragon supposed to gather from this? And what letters had the man delivered to Brom that made him leave in such a hurry? Why didn't any of this make any sense?

Rum. Rum. Something about the word made Eragon scratch his head thoughtfully; what was it? Rum was a rather exotic alcoholic drink from the south. It was supposed to be warming on cold days. Morn had a jug.

Rum. Made in the south. Specifically, the town of….

"Feinster? Isn't that where…Brom was born?"

Eragon pocketed the flask with some hesitation, leaning back to sit on the floor and think. "What did he mean by cheating? Cheating at what and cheating with who?" It was a difficult puzzle, and Eragon couldn't make heads or tails of it. The man didn't precisely look foreign, nor was he from Carvahall. And he didn't have an accent that was placeable either. "...whoever he is, he knows Brom. And Brom left...

"I've got to find that old man and wring this out of him..." he concluded.

He was about to stand when he saw something from the corner of his eye, at the windowsill. He turned his head sharply to catch a fleeting glance of something moving outside of it. A flicker of light, very faint against the gray sky. Eragon jumped to his feet and leaped over a stool to reach the window, pressing his hands to either side as his nose almost bumped the glass; the flicker of light had vanished, and he couldn't discern what it had been.

"Eragon?"

He cursed softly under his breath; it was Roran, outside the still-open door. Eragon shook his head, passing off whatever he saw as trickery of the light on the faint snow that had just begun to fall, turning and nodding to Roran as his cousin stepped in the doorway. "Brom wasn't here; looks like he left in a hurry."

"Hmph. Crazy old storyteller," Roran said passively; he was holding a Y-shaped stick with a rock wedged in the Y, likely a destructive implement he had snatched from one of the rowdier boys in the village.

"Yeah...crazy."

Author's Note:

Oh dear, was I missed? Well crap! Didn't think anyone still read my stuff.

So, to sort of give you all something to chew on, I winged another chapter and am working on others. I wasn't expecting to ever finish this story, so forgive the haphazardness of this chapter? And the shortness; it's five AM.

As to where I've been? Working, graduating, playing Second Life, enjoying myself in general, taking a long break, and UTTERLY hating book three of this series. I mean COME ON Paolini? Your story is starting to sound like one of my fanfictions! (Oh yes, I went there.)

That said, I ignore the canonocity of Book Three. I'll write my stories as though it never was written and once this story is done...I might just focus on my own stories instead of writing fanfictions. My stories are a bit sad now that I'm looking at them again, and overall I just have lost interest. But don't worry, I'll try to get back in the loop and writye some more for you guys until I vanish completely.