Chapter Twelve: The Egg
A/N: I'm sorry for how short the previous chapter was. This one will be some of the good things, I promise you that.
ON TO THE STORY!
Arya shushed everyone, and spoke Will.
"You'd best come inside."
As they wound through various halls, she called over her shoulder,
"I assume Oromis told you a bit about our history?"
"Yes," Nico called back.
They went past a chamber filled with large round stones of varying colors. Nico lagged behind the group to look at them. Several of these odd stones seemed to follow similar color schemes, however one of them caught Nico's eye.
It was mostly black, but it also had golden streaks crisscrossing every which way. It seemed quite beautiful to Nico and he reached out to set his hand on the side of it. When he did, Nico realized that it was an egg: he could feel the soul of the baby inside.
Nico quickly looked around himself realizing that all of these stones were eggs. Nico backed slowly out of the room, hoping that he would not dame any of the eggs.
"Nico!" shouted will from the end of the hall. "Come on!"
Nico ran to join them on a large balcony over looking the entire area around the castle.
He looked as the big red dragon lay in what appeared to be slumber, while the other two thoroughly examined each other.
Nico brought his attention to the conversation, which appeared to be mostly conducted between Marco and the three riders, comparing notes about the atrocities of the villains. He didn't understand most of it. There was plenty of odd names and colors to go along with them.
Nico did notice that they refused to mention certain evil dragons in their narrative by name, instead calling them by their rider's names, like "Morzan's dragon" or "Kialandi's purple." Nico was curious, so he asked.
The Rider's expressions grew grimmer than they already were.
"The dragons were so furious when they found out that the Forsworn's dragons had betrayed them, that they banished their names. No one knows what they were called anymore," said Eragon.
Nico looked around and noticed something odd down the hall. Something was opening the door that the eggs had been in.
Nico looked around. No one had noticed. He was tempted to go investigate alone, but he had no clue what it was.
"Hey." Nico said, gesturing to the opening door. Everyone watched silently as the black and gold egg rolled out of it. Everyone stood and rushed to where it was. Eragon looked at it in amazement.
"The egg is hatching."
The baby dragon that had been encased in the egg slowly pushed its way out, shattering the egg in the process. Nico thought that it was a beautiful creature, almost the size of a small dog.
It extended its wings, revealing that it was almost all black, like its egg, except for where it turned gold on the creature's underbelly. It slowly shuffled towards Nico, looking at him with eyes of a beautiful silver.
Nico carefully touched the dragon's head. His hand was instantly filled with a tremendous pain, and every single scar on his body hurt like it had reopened. A shock of ice-cold energy shot from his palm to his mind and whirled there for a moment, before all of the sensations suddenly stopped, and Nico was left looking at his little dragon.
And then, Nico felt another mind touch his, filled with hunger, but also with a strange excitement.
"It's excited," Nico said, in complete and utter shock.
Eragon cocked his head, as if listening to something.
"It's no surprise. That's the oldest hatchling of the lot, almost as old as Glaedr himself."
Nico didn't know what Eragon was talking about, but he was filled with satisfaction, and an odd desire to provide everything this little dragon wanted. He tentatively tried to reach the dragon, stiffening when he did so. It was female, he could tell that much.
Nico, turning his attention to himself as Eragon, Arya and Murtagh all rushed off for unknown reasons, he found his health much improved. He would never admit it to Will, or anyone else for that matter, that Nico could feel the darkness pervading his very life force since the Athena Parthenos.
Now all of that was gone, leaving Nico feeling a whole lot more grounded than he had since Bianca's death. Speaking of Bianca…
"I want to name her Bianca."
The three dragon riders rushed back with handfuls of meat and gave them to Nico. Bianca was excited to see the meat and chirped happily, which Nico hadn't expected. Weren't they supposed to roar or something?
Nico began to feed his dragon, who happily snatched it up and ate it like it was the last meal on earth. Seeing as it had never eaten before, Nico supposed it was accurate.
When the dragon had finished eating, Nico noticed that on his hand, where he had touched the dragon, his palm had a silver, diffuse oval upon it. Nico began petting the dragon, finally looking around at his fellow demigods.
Marco was in complete and utter shock, and so was Will, but Will also looked admiring.
Reyna had actually fainted, which Nico made plans to tease her about later.
Christine, on the other hand, was the only one to not look pleased. In fact, she looked infuriated that Nico dared to get something cool like a dragon hatchling.
Later that day, you could cut the tension in the room with a knife. Reyna, Christine, and Marco all were upset that Nico had bound himself to Alagaesia, while Will of course defended his boyfriend.
Eragon and Arya were sort of in the middle, declaring that while they didn't like it either, there was nothing they could do to prevent it, seeing as it was specifically stated in the spells that the eggs destined for Riders would only hatch for the person destined to be their Rider.
Everyone bristled at the other groups, and all in all, it was both a good and a bad thing that a man raced into the room.
"Eragon Kingkiller, sir!"
Eragon winced at the gruesome nickname.
"Yes?"
"Darian Tabor of Dras-Leona has sent me to tell you that there has been strange fluxes of energy around Helgrind that the mages have been panicking over. They say something about sorcery and huge shocks of energy."
O cliffhangers, o cliffhangers,
I am so mean to my readers,
What will happen next?
You just wait and see,
O all the possibilities of twenty-eighteen!
See you soon!
-LordofNothing1
