Eragon Forever

Chapter 11: Mourning

Okay, sorry for the two months or so wait for another update, but I've been busy since last chapter with Coursework and revision for Mock Exams. Not to mention my laptop acting up all of the time. Anyway, Enjoy the Chapter.

It had been four days since Tathar and his group had left the main group, and they were heading back towards the shore where the rest of their people should currently camped. He along with Darius and Orison were feeling quite dejected, only being able to catch a couple of rabbits which they had eaten on their small detour. The Girls however didn't really mind, actually slightly annoyed at the Boys and their male pride making the atmosphere slightly less 'happy'.

"Tathar, Does it really matter that much?" Erisia asked, walking backwards beside Tathar so she could look at him.

He looked at her, her ocean blue eyes brightening his mood slightly, he sighed before answering, "Well, If I cant catch a simple deer, how will I supply for the Village or My Family"

Erisia scrunched her eyes together, pouting slightly as she formulated her response. "I'm sure you will get better at hunting. Besides, you would be able to provide for our your family some other way if hunting doesn't work out" She said, watching as Tathar's smile grew, if only slightly.

"Thanks Erisia, I needed that" He answered after a short pause, slightly captivated by the morning sun casting an almost ethereal glow. He then blushed slightly as he looked at her straight in the eyes, hoping that his blush would be disguised by the sun shining on his face.

They continued on for a short while like that, in companionable silence, only speaking the odd word now and then, pointing out sights they could see.

Syllva, who was walking with the other four a short distance behind Tathar and Erisia ran slightly to catch up to the two, looking slightly concerned. Syllva who was Aryvenne's twin sister, younger by only a few minutes had a completely different personality to her older sister, normally being very cheerful, more so than Erisia. When she seemed worried, something was definitely wrong.

The others also caught up, increasing their pace slightly, all of them showing the same expression of urgency Syllva had, other than her sister who rarely showed much emotion at all but still had a slight frown.

Syllva started saying something, however what she was saying didn't make much sense. She normally spoke quickly meaning you would have to pay attention to what she said or you would miss it. Now however, her voice laced with panic made what she said sound like complete nonsense, Tathar only able to make out the words 'Hurry' and 'Smoke'.

Darius, who had waited for a few seconds until Syllva finished decided to explain what she was trying to say, already knowing what she was trying to say. "She is saying that we should hurry because she saw smoke further down the shore from the camp"

They had only left the Forest a few minutes ago, so up until now their vision had been severely reduced meaning they couldnt see the shore. Tathar turned to look towards the shore where the camp should be and saw nothing. He then looked further to the south, and indeed saw a thick black veil of smoke rising from the ground from around the area the camp should have been yesterday. Sure there should be smoke from camp-fires, but nowhere near this amount, or posses the ominous feeling this black cloud had.

Tathar grew worried, and felt Erisia's hand on his shoulder. He turned to face her, seeing a slight look of dread in her eyes. "It's probably nothing, maybe a fire got out of control." She said, trying to convince herself more than the others.

"The camp might be where it's supposed to be, not... there" Orison added, trying and failing to hide the worry in his voice.

Tathar looked around at the others, realising they were all looking to him to decided what to do with almost pleading eyes. He knew he had two options, lie to them and say that everything was okay, or admit that something might be wrong. He knew the former was out of the question, being the option which would give them false hope, only to have the hoped dashed later on and them fall into anarchy. At least if he told them something was wrong they would be able to properly prepare for the worst.

"There is no smoke where the camp should be, but shouldn't there be some from the morning fires." He stated, seeing the expressions of each of his friends fall slightly, almost knowing what he was about to say next. "I'm the fastest runner, so I'll run ahead to check out what's going on. Darius, you're in charge, continue to where we were going, I'll meet back up with you there" He said, pleading with his eyes for his long term friend to keep everyone calm, to which Darius just nodded.

After distributing his pack and it's content among his friends, Giving the egg specifically to Darius, knowing that he would keep it secret from the others, he turned to the south-west before running off, the others walking directly west to the shore.

He ran for almost two hours straight, the ominous smoke rising in the sky as an ever present marker for his destination, dreading what he would find. He stopped for a couple of minutes to catch his breath before continuing, estimating that it would take slightly less than an hour before he would reach the shore. The grasses which were whipping his legs as he ran started to grow shorter and more sparse, indicating that he was almost there.

He climbed the small hill separating the land and the shore, the thick smoke almost choking him as it had done for the past few minutes. When he reached the top, his eyes quickly adjusted to show him what was the carcass of tents and other temporary buildings. This wasn't what caused him the most grief however.

Much of the ground was littered with the bodies of people who he had know, friends he had known for years, or people he had just met. He made his way down to the shell of what was the main camp, a lump forming in his throat as tears threatened to spill out of his eyes. He looked around, the foreboding he had felt on his way had been answered, and he was now left with an almost empty feeling as he saw most of the people in his life lying on the ground unmoving, many of them displaying fatal wounds which had been the cause of their death. Others had less fatal wounds and a trail of blood leading to them was evidence of their struggle before they passed out due to blood loss, never to wake up.

The attackers had made no discrimination between Healthy adults or Cripples, Old Men or Children, every single person had been cut down, many still with expressions of panic on their faces with hollow eyes. Tathar determined that this had taken place the night before Judging on the location of the camp and the state of dress the people were dressed in. He walked through the camp heading in the direction of the largest tent, or the charred centre pole which was the only thing left standing, the rest being burning cinders on the ground, or ash.

As he drew closer his destination, he started to feel hopeless seeing no living being around, tears which had pooled in his eyes started to trickle down his face as realisation as to what just happened hit him. Part of him wanted someone here with him to comfort him, someone who's shoulder he could cry on, but he also knew that he wouldn't want any of his friends to see this, which was the reason he sent his friends on to their original destination.

When he reached the tent, the sight which greeted him was enough for him to shout out in anguish. What Tathar saw in front of him was the blood soaked, slightly burned, unmoving corpse of his father. All cool he was keeping was lost and he let the tears spill from his eyes unheeded, streaking down his face and dripping onto the cold cheeks of the man he had come to see as a true father, even if not by blood.

"Why?, Why did this happen?" he screamed out, hoping someone would give him his answers so he could take vengeance, but knew that anyone who knew what happened here was dead or long gone with the plunder. Most of the possessions and food was taken, only leaving the burned remains of an entire village worth of lives. Tathar sat there for what must have been well over an hour, but Tathar didn't care, his life was over. After another few minutes which passed by at an unbearably slow pace, Tathar slowly stood up, knowing he had to move on with his life, no matter how much he wanted to just stay there forever.

He took a few steps away from the burnt body of his adoptive father, before looking back to the dreaded reminder that he had lost a second father, the tears in his eyes slowly stopping, whether that's from some sort of acceptance or that his eyes had dried up he didn't know yet, however he knew that if he truly wanted to accept the death of his father, a proper burial would be in order.

He started out to search of a shovel or anything he could dig a grave with, most of the tools being stolen or destroyed in the attack. After ten minutes of searching he finally found what he was looking for, however where it was was something he didn't need to see right now. On the floor in front of his was the pale face of Fegnus, his had firmly grasped around the handle of a blood soaked shovel. Next to him was what the blood was clearly from, a soldier in a strange uniform he didn't recognise, with a Sigil on his breastplate showing a Bird on fire.

He looked to his friend, the tears he thought he had ran out of starting to fall again, if only a slight trickle as he mourned the passing of one of his closest friends. "At least you went down fighting. Just like you Fegnus" He said, a sad smile at the final compliment he would give to his friend.

He dug Two graves, one for his Fegnus, and one for his father. He took the two of them up the hill slightly to bury them, knowing that during the spring the tide would reach up and take them out to sea if they weren't further away. It took him another hour to dig the graves and pile the earth over them. He would have preferred to dig graves for everyone, but with just him it would take too long to do. After the burials he made simple markers, placing the shovel down over Fegnus' as it was the weapon he used in his first and final battle.

He then turned to his Fathers Grave, to say a few words. "You may not have been my Father by blood, but you raised me, taught me everything I know. To me you are my Father, I may have been stubborn at times, but I Love you. Thank you for everything, I'll never forget you" He stood there for a few more minutes, silently grieving for those he lost today, before turning to head North to where his friends would be waiting.

When he left the burning remains of the camp, the people he had come to know and love, the pain still remained, if subdued slightly by the fact that he wasn't in the middle of the devastation. He knew that pain would never leave him, but knew that his friends could lessen the pain. He also knew that he would have to be there for them when he told them, all of them had parents, younger siblings, cousins and other Family which they will mourn.

After leaving the smoke covered air, he looked up and realised that the late morning sun had started to set, casting an eerie glow on the water. He then realised that meant he had been separated for well over five of six hours, and his friends will be starting to worry, especially Erisia who always worried more than she should do, even when they were both young. He was about to start to run, however in the distance he saw five figures walking his way, and only realised when he got closer that it was his companions who had come in search for him.

When he got a little closer, he waved his hands in the air to gain their attention, and noticed them pointing, and Orison running towards him, stopping several meters away when he saw the emotions clearly displayed on Tathar's face. His normally deep brown eyes were hollow, almost black pools, the skin around them red raw from rubbing the tears. The rest of his face was grey from the smoke, ill looking, making him look like a ghost of his former self. Erisia, who had just arrived along with the rest took one look at him before she engulfed him in a hug, which he only partially returned.

"I'm so sorry" Erisia said, gently stroking Tathar's back in a comforting manor as she let a couple of tears loose. "I should have come with you" she said, pulling back slightly to look him in the eyes.

Darius, who had a hand on the slightly older boys shoulder looked to Erisia. "Any one of us could have gone with him, but we were all scared to go" He said, looking around at the others who avoided his gaze, "Nobody should go through that alone" He said.

"No, I wouldn't want any of you to go through that" Tathar responded in a quiet monotone voice, broken up by the silent crying. Being here with the others now, he couldn't keep a brave face on.

"Does that mean...?" Aryvenne asked, the anguish clearly evident on her face, not needing to finish the question as Tathar just nodded, confirming all of their worst fears.

Syllva broke down crying, her normally bubbly personality nowhere to be found underneath all of the tears. "Even Mum and Dad?" She asked, not wanting to believe what she was hearing.

"I'm Sorry, there were no survivors" Tathar confirmed, tears forming in everyone's eyes. He didn't know what to do, he was prepared for what happened, but not this, he couldn't handle what was happening to his friends now, their lives crushed.

Orison, who had been quiet until now finally spoke up, "Can we bury them?" He asked, being the youngest he was holding it together quite well.

"I don't know, There are a lot of people, even with all six of us it would take all day. I could only find one shovel, but there might be more" He said, the other five looking to him with confused looks, other than Erisia who knew Tathar well enough to know why, she only hugged him tighter, causing everyone to hold off asking questions to prevent him from feeling any more pain.

"We should wait until morning before we go, I can't go back right now, it just hurts too much" Tathar suggested, the tears which fell from his face moments ago only evident in by streaks on his soot covered face.

"We understand" Darius said, looking around getting nods of confirmation from the rest of their group. "I would like to bury them as well, but I can wait for when you're ready to go back there" He said, getting a faint smile from Tathar as well as a small thanks.

Again, sorry about this late update. Anyway what do you thing, it's my first full Tathar Chapter, but I wanted to progress his story as well. Thanks for reading.