Chapter 14 Hurdles in a Long Journey
"Yes, we understand that. My question was what do we do next?"
King Larkin was getting quite irate with King Narhak's advisor. He was the most impatient of the monarchs, but then again…he just lost his kingdom. His people were dejected, and their stories of war and loss depressed the entire rest of Alagaesia that seemed to congregate at the capital.
Even in his days in the Varden, Eragon had never seen so many people in one city. So populated, and so saturated with people. Most men tried to enlist, but the meager rations they had were barely enough to buy food, let alone have a place to stay…if there were any left.
His Riders had begun the laborious task of weaving and building tents to sleep in. It may not have been an inn, but something over their heads, a place to stay was appreciated by many survivors. Eragon was proud of them, they had taken up the initiative on their own. The mark of true Riders.
Prowess in battle was only one aspect. Riders were servants of the people, the power they had was withheld with the moral conscience they develop. Thane, Dorsan, and Victor took to training some of the new recruits. The elves were less quick to warm up to the Riders. For the longest time…two centuries to be exact, the elves were warriors without equal. Urgals too bulky to be a threat, humans too weak, dwarves too short. And now, with the Riders, they found themselves bested, often not easily, but still bested by dwarves, humans, and elves alike.
Two hundred years after the war, Eragon mused, and the camaraderie we felt as Alagaesians fighting in a war was disintegrated.
You cannot have expected it to last.
I wanted it to last more than two hundred years.
Little one, we had a common enemy to unite us, and now we do so again. We shall be united once more.
But how to keep it?
That is a question that must be pondered.
Your wisdom is overwhelming.
She huffed through her nostrils, sending her annoyance at him.
Oh Saphira, what do we do?
Pay attention, for a start.
"Lord Eragon? Lord Eragon!"
He snapped out of his haze.
"Sorry, I was talking with Saphira."
King Narhak seemed to still be annoyed.
How long had the man wanted to get his attention?
"What did you say, Your Majesty?"
He sighed exasperatedly, "Your plan to fight against these foreigners? Do you have one?"
Eragon scanned the room ruefully, only Arya's eyes offered him some semblance of familiarity. Everyone else was different, they had no clue as to what he went through in the past. Was this why interactions between the immortals and mortals were so tedious? The memories of immortals ran farther than the lives of mortals. The greatness and sacrifices they made were lost on short memories, and perhaps that is why the camaraderie was reduced to nothing…no one cared to remember.
"Do we have the position of their military camps or main base?"
The monarchs collectively shook their heads.
"We are running blind then."
"We have no other choice." King Larkin replied haughtily, but Eragon made no acknowledgement.
He pulled out Ishmael's carefully drawn map, it would well used during this war.
Sticking a pin with a red painted paper flag on the end, he stuck in the encampment they had just recently demolished.
"We know there were nearly 10,000 men sitting there. Now, they are all scattered with their leader dead. Perhaps they will band together, or find their way to a previous encampment. My thinking is the latter, they are in a foreign land, they do not know how to find each other. Their only option remaining is how to get back to where they trekked so far."
"What do you say we do?"
He sighed, "It is a risky idea, but I think the benefits will outweigh the harm."
Arya looked at him, knowing full well what happened when he took that tone.
"We send scouts, no more than three a party, or one Rider who will be completely concealed to the world, they cannot be detected."
"And?"
"Track them down to their encampments. Chances are in our favor that they all will not retreat to the same place, judging by the various ensigns we burned through, as they all gathered from different places. If we send tracking teams down, we can pin point the location of camps and find their military base."
"What is so dangerous about this?" Mark, the king's advisor asked not so subtlety.
The man was tedious.
"If they are caught, Mark, then the scouts will be tortured until they speak, and our position, numbers, advantages, and disadvantages, strategies, everything, they will know. And then, we have lost the war. Our only option is to trick and hide every secret and strategy we have to win this war. We are grossly outnumbered by an enemy who knows our exact position, and is waiting to strike."
Mark shrunk back in the shadows, his advising mouth sewn shut by some invisible thread. King Narhak took this to heart and bitingly said with a hint of approval from Mark's eyes, "Then what do you propose?"
Eragon looked at him with wide eyes, was every leader plain incompetent, or was this some special treatment reserved for him? Arya looked at the blank expression on his face, and chose to insert her two-sense.
"The scouts and the Riders being sent to track and pinpoint locations of camps, I believe is what Lord Eragon proposed, and I believe the same. However, the Riders no doubt, will be fine on their own, the scouts however, I believe should be elves. Our numbers have not been lost as the men, and they are quicker on their feet, and easier to mask."
Narhak nodded, "Very well, begin your preparations, Queen Arya, Lord Eragon." And he swiftly left the room, Mark in tow.
Larkin stared after their retreating figure, and sighed deeply.
"Should you need any help with the preparations, please let me know." He turned back to them, "I am more eager for this war to be over, and I need to know how my kingdom is doing."
"King Larkin, we will do all we can to save your kingdom. Do not worry so much about what you cannot control."
He spared another glance at Eragon, and switched his eyes between the two of them. He graciously nodded and left.
Arya walked over to him, resting a hand on his muscular forearm, kissing his cheek quickly when they were isolated.
"Gather your Riders, Eragon. I shall do the same with my scouts."
"Arya…" He grasped her hand, locking it in place on his forearm when she moved to leave. Her eyes furrowed in worry.
"What is it, Eragon?"
"Iet Drottning, I fear for my Riders."
She kissed him, slowly, letting his worries cease and pulled back. His eyes were still closed, the lines of worry disappearing from his face, a sign escaping his lips.
"If only you would kiss me every second of the day, I would feel no worry for the rest of my life."
Running her hands through his soft locks, after a chuckle from his statement, she moved into his embrace, "You are a good teacher, Eragon. Your Riders are powerful and intelligent. They will be fine."
She glanced away, her eyes clouded by her long, thick eyelashes. Murmuring to herself, she buried her head underneath his chin. Not quite catching what she said, he asked her to repeat it.
A sigh and she pulled herself out of his embrace, her voice muffled by his skin no longer.
"You were less trained than them, and you survived the war."
He gave a sad smirk, a half smile, before imploring with his arms for her to return to his embrace. She followed blindly, his arms too much of a temptation. He stroked her hair, letting the his hands bury themselves in her raven, silk tresses.
"I was lucky, Arya, lucky to have my comrades think I was worth dying for."
She tightened her grip around him in a silent protest.
"It is true, Arya. Brom died to save me, Murtagh risked his life to get me to the Varden, you trekked across Alagaesia to find me. Who knows if I would have made it through without all of you by my side." He shook his head, "Nay, Arya, I would have never survived."
"Never say that!" A harsh whisper against his statement. "Never doubt that." A plea, an unrestrained plea to never speak of such an atrocity.
"Arya…"
But she shook her head to silence him, and he remained silent.
"Your pupils will be fine, they are trained well, they are strong and intelligent, and they have you, their teachers, and each other to look after them, as we have undoubtedly seen two nights ago."
Eragon nodded, "Yes, I suppose that is the case."
"Let us be off, there is quite a bit of work to do."
He agreed, and reluctantly let her leave his embrace. To his delight, however, she kept her mind merged fully in his, and her hand grasped around his until the last possible moment of detection.
"Who will you send?"
"The majority of the elves excellent at masking their trail left with you. Most never had a chance to be exposed to a real situation, mere drills and theory over actual practice."
Eragon nodded, "And war is the hardest teacher of them all."
"I will send Blodhgarm after the most difficult route, and Nari after another difficult route. The rest of the elves that left with you should stay behind and familiarize themselves and their student Riders. They are the best at keeping this uneasy truce between the Riders and the elves."
"Have there been many skirmishes as we have witnessed with Kyra and Kyrian?"
Arya shrugged her shoulders nonchalantly, "Absolutely nothing major. However, Kyrian and Kyra came from a very well respected lineage, and many elves admire their fighting prowess. The elves picking fights are only harping on minor issues that, as of now, are resolved over quite quickly."
"How come my Riders never came to me with these problems?"
"Do you really wish to be plagued by those minor problems? We both have much better things to do. I asked Vanir to keep a close tab on the encounters."
"Yes, but…"
She gave him a pointed look, "Your Riders did not ask your permission to start building temporary shelters for the displaced Alagaesians. They will not trouble you with these small incidents, none of which have escalated into actual swords being drawn, mind you. Regardless, it should be the case. Riders are a law unto themselves, they are independent of the institution, independent of you."
"I know that." He sighed exasperatedly, "It is just…" He trailed off, unbelieving of his own words.
"Just what, Eragon?"
"I never expected them to stop relying on me so quickly, that is all."
Arya laughed in their isolated corridor, "I can scarcely bring myself to believe how you will be as a father to our children, if you have so much trouble letting go of your students."
Eragon stopped in his tracks, pulling her to a stop. She whirled around, raven black hair falling serenely on her body.
"Do you think about children often?"
She looked away, "It has been over three hundred years since I was born, Eragon. Of course I think of children."
"What would you have done if I had never returned?"
Arya came closer, understanding what he was asking, would she have taken another mate, someone instead of him to bear her children with, instead of waiting when he had no intention of returning.
"I would have come to you, Eragon. After relinquishing the hold for the throne, I would have come to you."
Kissing him gently, languidly, she stepped away.
"Arya, I am sorry for…" But he was stopped with a finger on his lips.
"Hush, Eragon. I was not without my doubts, that maybe you would fall for some Rider or former student, or even one of the elves I had sent with you." She pulled herself closer in his arms, sighing contentedly as his engulfed her in his warm embrace. "I know you can fathom how much I love you, yet I know the doubts that plague your mind. I know of your insecurity when it comes to me."
"How can you stand to love someone who continually doubts himself when it comes to you?"
She stepped back from his embrace, just barely enough to skim his lips with her own, and then soundly kissing him back.
"I suffer from those same insecurities, Eragon. You see a Rider, one hundred years younger, barely understanding the power he controls, and I…I see a woman aged by her experiences, untrusting, hateful, brazen…sometimes in her ways, unable to see why anyone would fall for her. Yet we did, did we not? Fall for each other. It is only natural that I, lost to my father, banished by my mother have insecurities regarding myself. As do you, as a child you had such a responsibility placed on your shoulders, such horrors in your mind. Our shortcomings are easy to see by ourselves."
He hesitantly smiled, "You have no shortcomings, Arya Drottning."
She chuckled slightly, tucking her head underneath his chin, resting her cheek against his strong heart beat.
"And that is perhaps I fell for you. You do not wish to change me."
"You are perfect."
She kissed his jawline, "Only to you."
"I would not have, you know."
Arya pulled away from him, confused as to what he was speaking about.
"I would not have resented you if you had chosen someone else as your mate. I would have supported your decision."
The elf queen took his hand and started walking again, pulling him along with her.
"I know you would not have." She hesitated, collecting her thoughts, "They say, lovers and poets and writers, that true love means letting go when necessary. I know you would have let me go, Eragon, had I truly fallen for someone else, but that is why I love you. Only you love me enough to let me go, if that is what I wanted. But I do not."
Muttering under her breath, she caught herself in her thoughts when Eragon prompted her to speak again.
"I said my love is not as great as yours, Eragon."
The Rider stopped her, pulling her to face him, "Why do you say that? It is not true."
"I would have resented you, Eragon. I would never have had the strength to let you go, I would never let you go. You have to understand that each time I sent beautiful female Riders to you, or more teachers, each more eager and more skilled than the last, I thought I was sending away my chance with you. How could you desire someone so far away, when better women, more loving women, more complete women, not broken as the past and the war have done to me, were willing to fall in love with you? I did not think you would wait for me, I hoped, but I could not fathom as to why."
He framed her face with his hands, warm to touch, heated by his desire to show to her exactly how much she meant to him. Caressing her cheeks, he kissed her deeply, slowly willing to show her how or why, or that she was not at all what she pictured herself as. That she was more a woman than any one else in the world, that she was complete and loving, and not at all broken.
"Arya, iet nuanen Arya, my name has my love for you. My love was so strong it had the power to change my name, that part will never change, you must know this. You changed me, Arya. Only you."
Reaching her hands to hold his in place, she nodded as he brushed the few fallen tears from her eyes.
"We should go, Eragon. Enough of this talk, what we thought would happen did not, and we are here, together, for the rest of eternity or however long we last."
"I will not lose you." He replied determinedly. "Never again, will I lose you."
She kissed him, "And neither shall I lose you."
A gust of wind blew against the windows, making an abnormal amount of noise for the quiet hallway. Arya sighed against him, after jumping slightly at the sounds.
"We should be more careful." Eragon whispered, "Who knows who is watching the shadows?"
"I doubt your Riders know nothing of us, and the elves are quick to find out."
"I am more worried about the humans, Arya. They do not know of our relationship, what we went through together. They know nothing of our experiences, and they are not quick to trust us. If they realize we are in a relationship, they will think I am giving preferential treatment to your decisions, even when your decisions are the right ones or the best ones available."
"It could be problem, yes. But do not fret over it. As you said, they know nothing still. Not even a hint of us."
He nodded and stepped away. "I must go and speak to a few of my Riders. I shall send about ten in opposing directions."
"In a team? Or?"
"Two Riders, I think, together will be must stronger than one…obviously. In terms of scouting or keeping each other safe, I think two will be better."
"Will you pair Ishmael and Amatria?"
Eragon shook his head, "No. They are in love, whether or not they realize it yet. I do not want them in danger because of the distraction they pose each other. I would rather they be motivated to come back quickly."
"Then who shall you send together?"
"Kyra and Amatria will go together. I trust their judgment and skills together. Marcus and Thane are good friends, they will fare well. Ishmael and Isaac will scout the eastern side, Maria and Elbryn will take the western most side. Victor and Fenrir will take the direct south." Eragon thought for a moment, "Kyra and Amatria, as well as Marcus and Thane will take the in between sides."
"Directions from our encampment?"
"Hmmm?" Eragon was lost in thought, forcing him to think back to her statement.
"Oh no. Not directions from our encampment. From their campsite we destroyed."
"And the elves?"
Eragon turned to face her, "They have more knowledge of the tracks our enemies make. I think they would best suited to follow the tracks from the ground, see if anyone escaped, they will also be better able to mask themselves should there be a need to do so."
"Do you think they would have fled north?"
"To Illirea? I doubt it. If they had, our lookouts would have seen them, the dragons, when they hunt they would definitely have seen them. Their vision far exceeds ours, and they are quite vigilant when it comes to hunting."
"Indeed."
Arya stepped away from him reluctant, it seemed, to do so. But even they knew the importance of duty, moments like these were short lived at best.