First off the bat, I AM SO SORRY FOR THE DISAPPEARANCE PEOPLE! I HATED LEAVING LIKE THAT.
With high school and homework and dealing with a boyfriend, it's a lot to juggle...
Just to let you guys know, it may take me awhile, but I'm never abandoning this story! So ease your worries! Thank you for all of the kind reviews!
One last message to UltimatumTM, THANK YOU FOR BEING THE BEST BETA EVER:)
Now on with the show!
This madness was as tainted as a sickness. It felt as if black sludge had made its way into her lungs and kept her from breathing. Words from tattered conversations swirled around her skull like a chaotic thunderstorm. Colors were warped, and reality twisted. Had she really gone insane from the magic? Or had she caught some sickness that held her in a deluded dream, that altered reality and bent the truth?
Arya reviewed her itinerary, while there was a brief lapse within her mind. Glenwing, Faolin, and herself had been traveling through the forest. She had the dragon egg clutched in her hands, in the brown sack that hid it from view. Even now she felt its coarse, rough cloth beneath her delicate fingers. But now it felt limp, lifeless. There was no blue stone-like egg near her.
The elf panicked, wildly distancing her mind from her body to see if she could sense the infant dragon. Arya knew she was risking her secrets by crossing the mental barriers to protect her consciousness from intruders, but the safety of the dragon was worth more than her own life.
A familiar aura caught her attention. She spread her mind towards the little animal, but stopped when the elf felt another blend his own identity with the dragon. Curious, Arya tried to read the man's thoughts, but when she attempted to enter his consciousness, she hit the steel-harden walls of his mind.
Deciding it would do more harm to break into the man's thoughts, the elf backed away. However, the worry over who the new Rider was was staggering, even for an elf's love for the dragon species. All of her people had warned her that committing themselves to other beings could potentially shatter their weak hearts when their companion dies. Perhaps she had gotten too attached to the dragon...
No, Arya told herself, the only people who ever truly knew me are dead. Or as good as gone. The dragon was only a duty to serve my people. Nothing more.
A sharp pain behind her slanted eyes became an uproar, dominating the entirety of her head. It reduced her to less than a beast, thrashing into oblivion. One thing kept ringing in her skull, freedom of torment. This is why her body refused to give in. It was trying to escape the shattering agony it was enduring.
Fortunately, she lost herself before the pain overcame her completely. The feeling of nothingness was never so blissful.
The first thought in her head when sanity once again claimed her was the reminder that her companions were brutally slaughtered by a troop of Urgals and the Shade leading the creatures to do the foul deed. The mental wall she had long since perfected shattered into many unfixable pieces.
Unwanted tears sprang to her slanted green eyes as Arya saw again and again the thin blade pierce through Faolin's heart, the blood that spewed from the injury, his eyes glazing over as death took yet another life that was slain by the Mad King's terrible war.
A needless , terrible war that would have been avoided if one man's stupidity and arrogance hadn't gotten his dragon killed, Arya thought with bitterness.
No one wanted it. War is a terrible thing, bringing only sadness and death even if good intentions were behind its making. Families are lost in the fray, societies and peace are nothing but a faint recollection of what might have been.
Then hope finally sprouted when they had the blue dragon egg. Should it hatch, the Rider would quickly be trained. The Varden could finally have an advantage in the decades old war. Now the hope of millions was gone. And Arya knew it was because of her incapability of protecting it.
I must at least show my face in light of my mistake. No matter the consequences, and no matter the shame. Arya swallowed a lump in the back of her throat. To why she was so worried over opening her eyes, she couldn't explain to even herself. But in times of weakness, a flicker of strength will always pass through. A saying from old tomes that applied to her now.
Her elegant slanted eyes blinked open to find herself on horseback.
Brom was poking the fire with his walking stick, watching the sparks jump and attempt to set the oak branch alight. Yet his master, the one who trained Brom to be a Rider, had placed powerful spells only a Rider can preform upon this worn wooden stick. It couldn't burn if Brom was the one holding it.
An empty flask was clutched feebly in his other calloused hand. The sharp, sweet smell of ale hung heavily overcast, like a snowstorm in Palancar Valley. Brom knew he was drunk when he saw the shapes of the fire's forked tongues warp into monsters. Great gaping jaws and wispy claws reached toward him, but when the Rider blinked the godforsaken shapes dispersed into clouds of black smoke. Dropping the silver laced flask, he let the malformed creatures have at him.
He nearly fell asleep when none of the shapes made a move to harm him. Their jaws clamped over flickering teeth and nearly growled in distress. The former Rider sighed as he heard the lonely howls of the Shrrg in the distance. Shrill cries to fading moonlight, almost like a prayer to some distant god that none of the races knew existed.
It truly would be blissful when the only pains you had to endure would be physical... To be a creature without a name, would feel ever so blissful to the aged Rider.
There would be no war slaughtering innocent lives, no worries of betrayal or heartbreak. Yet the cries of a Shrrg sounded so heartfelt that feelings such as sadness and loneliness had to exist among all creatures, not just those that have the ability to reason. But because of the emotions, Brom felt spread thin, like butter spread over a piece of toast.
That was the reason he had the nasty addiction. Bodily wounds and aches are far better to treat than ones of the heart.
Those agonizing calls to the moonlight bayed and dwindled as time passed, but it was soft as a lullaby. Peaceful. Yet Brom never took a chance to truly relax. Not since THAT night. The very thought of him peacefully living his life in Farthen Dur while his beloved child was ensnared inside Galbatorix's spiderweb of deceit and madness was entirely dishonoring.
Angela had taken the werecat to see if they could find any edible mushrooms to make a sort of soup with. Brom wanted no part in it, as the last time he had her types of concoctions, his hair had turned purple.Which is never good to masquerade, he had told himself. Tonight she left to some abstract, abandoned corner of the forest to search for oddities and abnormal foods to create dishes of the same nature. Whenever he had asked why she created such maddening monstrosities, the witch had replied,
"Nothing goes together more than a wild pig and a sturdy mushroom! And I want to find out if I may too that!"
Honestly, the girl was very erratic, even more so then his wife around children. No wonder they got along so well. So close in personality that the two could have been doppelgängers. The werecat, however, was decent company, that is when he wanted to be seen of course. Or hear what Brom had to say. Otherwise the cat would lazily drift off into deluded daydreams.
He heard a slight moan and heard the shifting of a horses' hooves. The former Rider knew that the elf had awoken. Halfheartedly, he poured what remained of the thin soup from earlier inside one of the wooden bowls from the elves' own halls. King Evandar had actually sung these himself.
Yet none care for the past. It is only the future for which they place their worries.
Not ungratefully, Brom shoved the bowl back towards Arya. She seemed surprised that he had snapped out of his musings so quickly. Thankful, the elf softly said thanks to the man, yet got no response. The gesture with the bowl was so stiff and mechanical that Arya was surprised that this had become of Brom Elf-Friend.
He sat by the fire, and watched as the the twinkling embers sputter and die. Grunting, the former Rider threw in a few more sticks lying about. To be sure, Brom muttered in the Ancient Language.
"Brisingr..." A spark snapped and cackled to life. Then the remnants blazed with revitalized vigor. Reds and gold danced in intricate patterns as the wood was swallowed in burning infernos.
"Destructive and beautiful, like a dragon's entire essence, roaring and unafraid of any precarious situations they may be in." the old man spoke, not realizing the elf had heard him. She sat next to the old rider, sipping the broth silently while keeping silent vigil watching the fire.
Glenwing had once spoken of a time when elves had used fire to tell tales of old. That the pictures danced and laughed inside the burning mass, as if the elves watching were seeing it unfold right before them. Arya had regretfully been born in the time of war and heartbreak. Such things of beauty were never known in this time.
"Have I ever told you about my son?"
It was a whisper that was too weak to even be carried off by the wind. The breeze just silenced them just as soon after they were uttered. But thanks to Arya's hearing enhancement, she made sense of them before the words died. Yet she didn't reply either. The elf assumed that the former Rider had unintentionally let the secret spill from his lips.
The hypothesis however, was shot down when the tired man shifted his hawk-glance towards the elf. His eyes were dancing with the light and shadow from the flames. Yet their signature, radiant blue was apparent. They looked sickly, the alcohol in his pumping blood making those orbs appear to be monstrous.
"His name was Eragon..."
Arya swallowed. She knew she shouldn't be listening to a drunken man's confession. She wasn't some priest at Helgrind, nor did she want to invoke the Elf-Friend's wrath if he remembered this conversation. But the curious nature of her spirit arose. She had never even know Brom had even had a son.
"He was born a little over sixteen years ago. In fact, today would've been the day he became a man."
Hardly likely he was as mature as his father, but then again, Brom has become a drunkard.
"A man doesn't choose his father, but a man can choose to take the son of another..." Brom rasped, his voice coarse with sadness and emotion. His grip on the walking stick turned his thin fingers to a bone white color. Of course the rest of the man's guant stature was supported with the paleness of his wrinkled skin.
"Galbatorix stole him… he stole him... he stole him..." those three words seemed to meld with the wild calls of wolves. The animals picked up the lyrics and turned them into a work of a beautiful song. For some time, Arya noticed that the howls matched the pattern of the old man's spoken thoughts. Then, a split second silence rang out like a gong. But then, the whispers became a roaring battle-cry. A flurry of angry growls and snarls filled the air. The crescent moon, as thin as a cat's smile, seemed to have camouflaged itself into a coating of pale orange-red.
Brom whipped his head toward the flames and found his monsters snapping and cackling at the sudden fear overcast. Their amber eyes gleamed frightening blood lusts as they lashed their wavering claws in the air. The air itself felt it as if it were too loud. Brom clasped his hands over his ears, the roaring and noise faintly distinguished behind the protection of his hands. However, the elf princess, oblivious to the maddening sights Brom was experiencing, decided to slip into her waking dreams. She listened to a cold wind shriek against the trees and ripping their leaves off their pale bark before the night vanished into a colliding mix of starlight and midnight. Suddenly the Rider smelt a metallic odor wafting into his nostrils, blending with the smoke. He knew it to be blood. Those three words that appeared to have been wrought from a voice in his head leapt up to his lips, without consent from his raveged mind.
"HE STOLE HIM!"
Halfway across the world, a boy shifted and groaned in his sleep. Nightmares plagued his unconscious mind, a depiction of the authoritarian pasted behind his eyelids. Eragon had trained himself not to cry out when the terrifying images disturbed his sleep. The boy only subconsciously bit his lip and curled into himself. A tiny blue dragon whimpered as its perch moved against its wishes, but made do with curling itself up on her Rider's chest. A hand pressed onto the rocky terrain, and when it was removed, the wet stickiness known as blood was left behind. Eragon mumbled incoherent words in his sleep, remaining unconscious of the warm substance dripping onto his blankets, and into his mouth.
I apologize for my imagination if it disturbed you LOL;) Hoped you enjoyed it!
Review Question: Why do you think Brom is acting like this?
Dragon Out!