Warm moss padded the blue elf's footsteps as he approached a great waterfall lined with blue and pink crystals. He stood for a moment, brushing droplets of water from his brow and concentrating on the shape of the stones at the base of the falls. He decided that their design was likely to promote bathing and wondered who would go so far outside Du Bleikrsolus to wash.

Blödhgarm had spent his days exploring since they arrived on Nierbölr and Eragon had once again been thrown into the political life of a shur'tugal. Today he was exploring the area of land northwest of Du Bleikrsolus after having discovered that the southern region was largely swamp land and east was, of course, the ocean. Although Blödhgarm could swim quite well and was certainly capable of studying the marshes and beaches of Stonrakr, he definitely preferred not to have to get wet if he could avoid it. However, the waterfall was too beautiful to ignore and he hummed in his chest, greeting nature with a song the way he had learned in Du Weldenvarden.

Allowing his mind to brush the consciousnesses of the creatures and plants around him, he was surprised to realize there were no animals bigger than the small mouse nibbling on a bulb of some plant he didn't recognize. Concentrating, he pushed towards the bottom of the lake swallowing the water from the fall and discovered a variety of fish and creatures there. Strange tracks and scratches around the edges of the lake told him the animals inside it were not restricted to it and he wondered how far they had to go on land to hunt.

He closed his mind again, worried these strange creatures might use mental attacks to catch their prey, and continued around the edge of the lake to the crystal walls near the torrent of water pouring from a crack in the cliff face around 20 feet above his head. As he got close, he realized that they weren't crystals sticking out from the wall but millions of tiny pores that revealed crystal beneath the rock face's grey surface.

As he was examining this feature of the waterfall, a small pebble bounced by his feet. Without hesitation, he turned and crouched, hissing and pulling a knife from a sheath on his thigh. Holding the knife in front of his face, he bared his wolf-like teeth in the direction the pebble came from and growled in his throat.

You're jumpy. A voice in his mind said, regardless of the barriers he'd thrown up. He didn't even feel anyone try to enter his mind, and he froze in shock, eyes wide and muscles clenched.

You're also wrong. I'm behind you. He risked a glance behind him and saw a small elfin woman—he would have assumed it was a child if he hadn't known better—staring at him with large round eyes the colour of sand. Everything about this person was pale as if she'd been caught in a sandstorm and bleached in the sun.

He growled louder this time, his nose puckering up in a menacing snarl. The woman giggled a high laugh that reminded him of rocks blowing over each other in the wind. She jumped down from the rock she was on and approached him slowly, surprising him by being even shorter than she had first appeared. Her head came up to the bottom of his sternum.

"Astra esterní ono thelduin, Blödhgarm." She said aloud, twisting her hand in front of her chest and inclining her head towards him.

"Mor'ranr lífa unin hjarta onr-?" He responded habitually, more surprised now than anything, although he was still on high alert and his fur bristled.

"They call me the Akr unin du Und, the Mist in the Void. But I prefer Tawny." She smiled, revealing sharp, feline teeth and her cat eyes flashed.

Sitting on large flat stones in a cave behind the waterfall, Blödhgarm kept his eyes locked on Tawny as she moved around, preparing the meal she had insisted they shared. She pulled a variety of toasted herbs from a small stone oven, wrapped half of them in slices of meat and half in strips of dough, and then dropped them onto a hot stone in a fire in the middle of the room. She tended them carefully, turning them so the meat became crisp and juicy and the dough became golden brown.

When it was time to eat, she carefully separated the pile and provided Blödhgarm only with those without meat. He eyed her curiously and took a hesitant bite, watching as she poured thick white cream from a flask into a bowl and lapped at it with her small rough tongue. He needed no more confirmation.

"I didn't expect to find werecats here." He spoke softly, aware of his wolf-like features and deeper voice.

"I didn't expect to enjoy the company of someone who doesn't eat meat, but here we are! And you certainly seem pleasant enough." Tawny took a bite of her food, ripping the meat apart while the blue elf stared, shocked.

Don't be such a stick in the mud, she thought to him, presumably because her mouth was busy chewing on particularly large piece of meat. The formalities of new friends are a waste of time.

He said nothing but she must have felt his mental scoff and she squinted at him with frustrated eyes.

"No good?" she finally asked, nodding at his still full plate.

He took a bite to escape having to say anything else, finally moving his eyes down to his meal and away from her strange face. Settling in, they didn't speak again until both of them had finished their food and Tawny had lapped up the rest of her milk.

"What is it from?"

"Dandelion milk, actually. Not as good as skula milk but certainly easier to get. Skular," she responded to his questioning expression, "are those strange creatures A'Eragon keeps seeing Zi'Yawne ride around on. She goes everywhere on those things!"

Blödhgarm recalled seeing the green lady soaring around on the back of a creature like a stone dragon with a short snout and two sets of wings and assumed that's what she meant.

Indeed, she answered.

Blödhgarm growled and stood harshly. "Stay out of my head, werecat."

Tawny giggled and began licking her fingers. "You wonder why I know so much. How I know so much."

He didn't answer, frustrated that she seemed to get so much from his short answers. Muttering under his breath, he considered the crystals in the pores of the rock and wondered if he could access them closer from inside the cave. Eyes darting, he began searching for cracks or crevices, certain that the mouth of the cave was not the only way Tawny got in and out.

"What else lives around here? I can't imagine you like the water enough to hunt in and out of it."

She shivered, as he knew she would, imagining the lake's water on her lovely skin or fur.

Lovely? Blödhgarm shook his head to clear it, surprising himself with his assessment.

"Druknablakya. They catch their prey in their mouth and roll to drown them and break their bones. They have learned, however," she smiled wickedly, admiring her fingernails and, Blödhgarm suspected, imagining her claws, "to share."

"Are you spinning stories again? Yarn is for spinning, stories are for telling, and don't get those things confused!" A familiar voice sang through the cave and Blödhgarm realized that one section of rock wall was an illusion when a woman with wild hair and a dirty face walked through it towards them, and Angela the Herbalist threw a ball of yarn at a very excited Tawny.