Chapter twenty: Elves
Two weeks had passed since the battle of Tronxheim had ended. This victory and the great damage that two of the greates cities of the Empire, that coupled with the coming of a Dragon Rider, Brom's return and te elves restabilishing their alliance with them had taken the morale of the Vardens to an all time high. Ajihad had returned after a week of scouring the tunnels to clean the place from any Urgal that might have stayed behind, - and had declared that they would have to move to Surda to facilitate an assault on the Empire and because Tronxheim had been compromised and did was no longer a safe place for them to hide. That had been welcomed form the general populace whos confidence in their capabilities had been bosted by their recent victories.
The transferring of such amount of people was a logistical nightmare until Harry came along claiming that he could teleport the entire Varden population through the use of Portkeys, they had just give him the location where they would like to be transported to and enough rope to produce enough portkeys. The plan was for the people to be transported through portkey while Harry transported the living stocks, furnitures, crops etc. thus making possible for the Varden to be accommodated in Surda before the Empire could react or know about it. Then the elves had politely asked (read demanded) for the Varden to keep their part of the bargain and send Eragon to Ellesmera for him to be trained in becoming a true Dragon Rider.
That had caused Brom and Harry to up the amount of political training Eragon received and by the end of the one week of time they had, Eragon had become a capable politician himself, meaning he would be capable of handling himself while dealing with elves for as long as he spoke the lest amount of words possible. Saphira had been training hard in controlling her power and she had advanced a lot, while not capable of using such energy at will she could use it without needing for her to be in life threatening situation or for her emotions to flare up. Brom himself had been surprised by this as he had been taught thay Dragons couldn't access their magic at will but then he had resigned when he saw a smirking Harry about to explain why Saphira could do what others had not been capable.
Eragon was moving toward the valley where the battle had been fought. He could still hear mourning wails even a week after the funerals of those who had fallen in the battle, - had finished, most of the Vardens were wearing black clothes to signify their mouring period. When people caught sight of him they started whispering, apparently people had taken to calling him and Harry as Shade slayers, well that and the fact that he was in his full combat armor, the armor gifted to him by Hrothgar,- and he looked, at least according to some of the magicians and soldiers that he had overheard,- as someone of immense power and wisdom in it. After a few minutes he had gotten there to find Saphia having a mental conversation with Harry, which caused Harry to break into fits of laugher, next to them stood Orik and Hrothgar, both wearing their full battle armor and Orik keeping a bag full of what he would take with him for this trip, a little away stood Ajihad and behind were the entire Varden council.
While Ajihad and Jormundur were wearing armors and beneath them the costumary balck clothes, the council was wearing colorful robes and the female members wearing jewels, thus trying to show that mourning was beneth their station. Eragon was tempted to blast them off but he steeled himself not wanting to make enemies with them because they had quite a bit of influence with the Vardens but that didn't mean that he couldn't show some contempt at them after their countless attempts at bribing him to swear an oath of loyalty to the Vardens and thus indirectly to them and not Ajihad, they were lucky he hadn't told Harry that they wanted or he would have blasted them from the face of the earth, he was protective like that.
Gathered around Saphira, Murtagh and Harry stood the stoic elves, wearing their customary leather armors and in honor of the Vardens mouring periods they had Harry change the colors of their clothes into black. They were eying the Varden council with concealed contempt, their facila masks nigh-impenetrable but any magician that knew how to open his minds for threat could feel the emotions coming from their minds, - the most disgusted seemed to be Aria. Upon seeing him approach Aria gave him a courteous but still cold, - nod, he guessed she might have been a bit angry at the fact that he had kissed her before he went to face the Shade seeing as he might have died during such a battle. The other elves did the same gesture as Aria but still theirs didn't convey the same frostiness as Aria's gesture.
"Welcome Shade slayer" said Hrothgar with a genuine smile on his face.
"I hope you had a good time here with the Vardens?" asked Ajihad, clearly not liking this formal pleasentries.
"Well as good as you can get after a battle with the Empire" replied Eragon with a straight face, while laughing within at the faces the council made.
"Show some respect boy, you're talking to the Leader of the Vardens" spoke one of the members of the council name Falberd.
"Watch your tongue councilor, you to are talking to the leader of the Order of Dragon Riders" answered Eragon with a tone that demanded respect and a stern facial expression "Oh boy I'm enjoying this to much and apparently so are the elves" thought Eragon seeing the red faces of the councilors and the faces of Ajihad and Hrothgar that were barely restraining themselves from laughing.
"You still need us as allies" said Umerth.
"Please you need me not the countrary, as for allies, the Dwarfs, Elves and the people of Surda will suffice, no offense to you Ajihad" said Eragon.
"None taken" replied Ajihad his eyes twikling with mirth at the situation that they found themselves.
"Eragon, stop playing with the vermins its time to leave" said Saphira projecting he thoughts for all present to hear.
"Eragon we're late, Saphira's right" said Harry, semding thus a veiled insult at the council who upon realizing grew an interesting shade of red.
"You're no longer welcome with the Varden" said Elesari to Harry.
"This is not your decision to make Elesar" warned Ajihad.
"But he…" Elesar started to justify herself but was cut off.
"He simply pointed at the fact that they are late for their journey" said Ajihad leaving no place for discussion.
"Ajihad-Elda, thank you for your hospitality but we must leave now" said Aria with a slight bow to show her respect for Ajihad.
"It was our pleasure Aria Svit-kona, i hope you enjoyed your time here and will return with us soon enough" said Ajihad meaning "Return as soon as possible because you're the only elf my people are comfortable with"
"Of course Ajihad-Elda, I will return as soon as I can, in the meantime a friend of mine will replace me as ambassador, he will be here any day now" replied Aria meaning "as soon as Eragon has finished his training I will be back in the meantime another elf will come to keep them in check, until I'm back"
"That's great news" said Ajihad with a smile.
"Aria come here and will you please bring Orik here, you're the only ones that I have yet to cast the Feather-light charm on" shouted Harry.
"Of course Harry" said Aria with a smile and "lightly" pushed Orik forward.
"So Eragon have you had any luck breaking through the "Ice Queen" façade yet?" asked Harry as Aria left to leave the last orders to the elf magicians.
"I somehow don't think that that is a façade" replied Eragon.
"Are we ready to leave?" asked Aria having sneaked upon them with her elven speed.
"Now we are" said Harry casting the charm upon her.
"Good we will fly directly to Elesmera, the outpost have been warned of us but we will have to stop three miles from the city, from there we will proceed on horseback" said Aria.
"That means we will fly through the desert?" said Orik.
"Yes but don't worry, we'll be there in five days give or take one day" said Harry.
"I don't think it will be that quick unless Saphira can fly faster than last time" said Aria.
"I can" replied Saphira with the draconic equivalent of a smug grin.
"I am still faster than you" said Hary levitating himself
"You'd wish" replied Saphira as with a single push of her wings she lifted herself from the ground and shot in the direction of the desert at breackneck speeds.
Laughing Harry propelled himslef at the same speed as Saphira and after a few seconds he caught up with her and waving his hands as to say goodbye he shot forward leaving Saphira and the rest of the party surprised at the speeds he could fly at. Trying to keep up with Harry, Saphira increased her speed becoming a blur to any outside watcher, causing Orik to curse at every Dwarf god in existence for forcing him to go with a band of lunatics. That was answered with laughs from both Aria and Eragon.
Four days later they were finally but an three miles from Elesmera and luckily Orik had stopped complaining by the third day of their trip, although he had pushed even the stoic Aria, to actually snap his neck so that he would stop complaining, and that was in three hours since they started their trip, luckily Harry told them to use magic to drowned all noises around them to stop his constant nagging. Aria was actually mortified that she hadn't though about that herself but when someone is shouting at the top of his lungs you can't exactly think very well, they weren't emotionless machines that thought only using logic.
Orik, when he wasn't complaining about flying, - was a very nice person a tad sarcastic but still nice. Harry got to know him better since Eragon already knew him from hanging around in Tronxheim, while Harry was to busy staying in his laboratory or fliring with the red haired beauty that was Saelihn, - and Aria had already known him for quite some time in her quality as Ambassador for the elfs, albeit she hadn't known that he could shout (read scream) so loud as to damage even Eragon, less sensitive, human eardrums. He was a pretty good dancer, at least when it came to dwarven dances,- he was a master, even by his clans standarts and boy they were high,- when it came to creating devices, whether they were made of wood,stone or metal. Orik had given them a few rings of gold that when properly arranged formed a full gold ring, nedless to say that Harry and Aria solved it within a few minutes but Eragon no matter how many combinations he tried didn't solve it.
A good thing that came form this trip was that Eragon and Aria finally reconciliated. She didn't even last the full day, initially she pretended to do that because she didn't want to interfere with her position as an ambassador for the elves, but she couldn't ever stay angry with Eragon especially after he took her aside for a talk. Harry didn't know what he told her but it clearly worked as his empathy stopped acting up at Aria's negative emotions. When Eragon returned he was a bit bruised and justified himself by saying that he had a bit of sword practice wit Aria, he didn't lie, Harry knew that much but Aria must have lost her composture to give him those kind of brusises. Harry was just glad that Brom wasn't there or things would have been worse with his whole "you're-a-Dragon-Rider-and-not-a-kid" thing, he didn't want Eragon to end up scarred from Brom's overly serious attitude, could you imagine an overly serious Eragon, just the though sent shivers down Harry's spine.
What really had Harry worried was the dreams that Eragon had started having premonitory dreams, only this time he wasn't seeing his battle with Murtagh on the Burning Plains but instead he saw a shady figure in an apocalyptic background, a city reduced to nothing more than rubble, unnatural flames burning in the streets and a shadowed dying man, blood spilling from his mouth as he said one sentence "fools you have no idea of what you have done", his dream was interrupted before the shadowed man could say more but it was still troubling because he had never seen such a thing before. To mke up for the bad news Murtagh's egg was about to hatch, at most within two days but if they were lucky in a few hours, the magic of the woods was too active all the time making his prediction of such an event a bit hard but then again life wasn't supposed to be an exact science.
Landing with inhuman grace Harry waited for Spahira to land with a big thud to and he wasn't disappointed as true to his prediction Saphira landed with a big thud, she liked to show off… a lot. He looked around the clearing where they landed, totally ingnoring Saphira, he really like to mess with her, - there was a small creek with crystal clear water passing through, the grass and trees were the same shade of green as the rest of the trees and grass in Du Weldenvarden and in the ege of the clearing stood four white horses, intelligence shinning in their eyes as thet eyed him and his party, before coming forward. An elf came forward introducing himself as Aeson and then proceeded to introduce them to their horses, Harry not having taken one preferring to run instead, - stayed aside waiting for the formalities to be over because even if he was very skilled when it came to politics and knew how to appear respectful and well-mannered very well he avoided it as much as possible, he hadn't changed in that regard and would never change.
After mounting their horses they started to travel toward Elesmera on foot as entering Elesmera on Dragon back was unwise because while Elves and Dragons had became allies after the end of their war, most protective wards had never been taken down and unless you had a ring that pronounced you as a friend of the elves, going anywhere near elesmera on Dragon back was very dangerous unless you were the first Eragon and his Dragon, those two were tied to the very forest and the wards wouldn't do anything to them. After one hour spent talking about the story of Du Weldenvarden, between the five of them, - they came to a clearing where a very oppressive magical pressure was situated and Aria gestured for them to stop and they did so. From the shadows of the trees an elf came forward, the elf was wearing a white, flowing robe, in his forehead he had a silver circlet and his face radiated Wisdom, earned through ages, - wisdom and nobility.
"Eragon show him your palm and whatever you do, do not try to deny him access to your mind, the same goes for all of you" said Aria whispering.
Eragon did so and smiling the white robed elf locked eyes with him and for a moment Eragon felt an overwhelming presence enter his mind, a presence that dwarfed even the presence of Togira Ikonoka by a great margin and was tempted for a moment to close his mind to it but Aria's warning stopped him from doing it and luckily a moment latter the presence left seemingly satisfied from what he saw. The same process was repeated on everyone, not even Aria was exempted from such a procedure but when he looked into Harry's eyes and the elf failed to enter his mind he simply rasied his eyebrows to Harry, who with an impish grin lowered his mental defenses. As the elf peered inside Harry's mind his posture changed from a relaxed, smiling posture to an awed and respectful postur, which totally surprised Aria who had never heard or seen Gilderien lose his composure like that, not even in the presence of the might of Vrael and his Dragon, which were pretty awe inspiring in their own right.
Moving his eyes from Harry the elf proceeded to bow to Harry and then gesture for them to pass. The group moved along the path and when Harry passed right next to Gilderien, the elf spoke.
"Welcome to Elesmera" said the elf before adding "Wandering Sage"
"I'm not much of a Sage really" said Harry rubbing the back of his head.
"Perhaps, am I to assume that this must remain between the two of us?" asked the elf.
"If such a thing is possible" said Harry.
"Of course, though I would advise you to meet Rhunon and forge new sword for the new Dragon Order" said the elf.
"And where is the catch?" asked Harry.
"She has made an oath to never forge swords so you'll have to make them yourselves and because of your capacitites you would be the best suited for this task" explained the elder elf.
"If you say so" said Harry shrugging and then moving forward to catch up with the rest of them.
It didn't take him a long time to catch up with them as thye had been going at a slow pace. Once he caught up with the group Aria fixed him with a glare that tld him to explain or a lot of hurt would come to him.
"So what do you want to know?" asked Harry although he knew what she was going to ask.
"Who are you that even Gilderien himself bows to you?" asked Aria with a puzzled look, a change from her stoic façade she ususaly kept.
"Let's say someone who has earned his respect and leave it at that" said Harry clearly showing that he was unwilling to elaborate further.
"You must have done something big, I mean even more so than rescuing those eggs or defeating a Shade for him to give you that treatment" said Aria her face returning back to her usually stoic look.
"Why, isn't that enough to earn such a respect?" asked Orik.
"No, Vrael himself had fought and destroyed dozens of Shades, he was the greatest leader of the Dragon Riders except the first Eragon himself and yet he wasn't given such an honor" said Aria "the only person except Harry to have been bowed to by Gilderien has been the first Eragon himself and that was many years after becoming the first Dragon Rider"
"What happened to Eragon" asked Eragon interested to know more about his namesake.
"He disappeared, just like that, the night before he was among us and the next morning he and his Dragon were gone" said Aria "thought here is no doubt that was he to come back he would be powerful enough to defeat Galbatorix and his Dragon with great easy"
"So he might be alive?" asked Eragon.
"He is, if he was dead I would have known" said Harry referring to the Deathly Hallows, a reference that Eragon understood, having been told about them "but he is hiding very well since I have yet to detect him"
"Wait why would you have known?" asked Orik.
"Orik don't bother he won't tell you, I'm the only one who knows how and no I'm not going to tell you either, I would never betray his trust" said Eragon.
"Dwarf I would recommend that you keep your curiosity to yourself especially since we are very near to Elesmera" said Aria coldly, clearly not content at Orik's attempt to pry information from Harry that had shown to be a shrewd man that had many secrets and the fact that he would trust only a small circle in which he had absolute faith.
"No offense Orik but this information is not one that I can't and will not divulge easy to any other person unless such a person has my absolute faith not to give it away" said Harry, stopping for a moment before saying "we're here"
"Indeed we are" said Aria dismounting from her horse "dismount everybody, you'll no longer need them and other elves will take care of them and your belongings"
Doing as Aria said they dismounted and immediately four elves appeared to take the horses away while Aria led them toward the residence of her monarch. Along the way, they began to see more and more elves as they gathered around Saphira and began giving her titles which didn't help her ego get any smaller. The city itself was magnificent, their infrastructure preefectly interwined with nature to such an extent that it was very hard to differentiate between them but what really stunned Eragon was a presence that his empathy picked up first, a presence so old and wise that he doubted it could be considered human or elfish anymore despite there being no doubt that it was once either an elf or a human he couldn't fully understand,- having by now transcended human comprehension nad was well on its way to became something akin to a minor deity, it had access to all the magic of the forest after all.
After ten minutes they found themselves before what could be described as a palace made of trees and their branches interwined in such a way that made it seem otherworldly, elves were very given into making their living places the most mesmerizing as possible. Two guards opened a door and they entire group found themselves inside an enourmous room, the roof of which was made of interwining branches,- on the sides of this room stood twelve thrones on each side and in the middle of these thrones stood another throne made of roots. The thrones on the sides were occupied by twenty four elves, half men and half women and in the middle of them stood Queen Islanzadi, her face greatly resembling that of Aria, well for Harry at least since he knew who she really was.
As soon as they entered the entire ecouncil bowed as one toward Eragon and his friends and so did the entire group and they began with the pleasentries which Harry really hated once the pleasentries were finished Islanzadi moved forward and hugged her saying "I'm glad you're back home my daughter". Causing Eragon, Murtagh and Orik to stiffen at the news, as for Harry he couldn't care less, in fact he tuned out the apologie talk since he already felt that it was seventy percent fake and once it was over he focused back as Islanzadi moved forward toward Eragon.
"I apologize for my disregard toward you who are our more honored guests"said Islanzadi
"Islanzadi Drotning. Astra esterni ono helduin" said Eragon as he knew he must have talked first.
"Atra du evarinya ono varda" replied Islanzadi, her face betraying her surprise at Eragon's knowledge at their etiquette.
"Un atra mor'ranr lifa unin hjarta onr" said Eragon completing the ritual and Sapira then did the same ritual mentally.
"What is your name Dragon?" asked Islanzadi after the ritual was over.
"Saphira" replied the Dragon mentally.
"Welcome to Elesmera, Saphira, and what's your name Rider?" asked Islanzadi.
"Eragon Shade slayer" answered Eragon eliciting a great deal of murmurs from the elves present.
"A powerful name , rarely given to our own children" said the queen clearly surprised at his name "welcome to Elesmera Eragon Shadeslayer, I've not had the pleasure to be aquitaanced with the two of you" said the queen referring to Murtagh and Harry.
"My name is Harry Potter but some cal me also Harry the Shade slayer" said Harry eliciting even more murmurs at the proclamation of his feat.
"Incredible for such a human to gain such a titlte at such a young age nonetheless" said the queen, her poker face totally gone as she openly stared with incredulity between Eragon and Harry "and what might your name be young one" asked the queen referring to Murtagh
"My name is Murtagh Morzan son" replied Murtagh causing the murmurs to increase and even some signs of hostility to show between the elves and even Islanzadi's eyes hardened.
"He forgot to metion being a future Dragon Rider and the person who saved Ajihad's life during the battle of Tronxheim and one of the finest swordsman I've ever meet" said Harry with a warning tone toward the counciland the queen whi was further surprised at the news.
"I didn't know that another egg was stolen from Galbatorix" said the queen.
"Both have been taken, not stolen because it was him that stole them in the first place" said Harry nonchalantly.
"How did that come to happen?" asked the queen.
"Well, I'll let Eragon and Saphira tell it, they can explain better and for further detail you can ask Murtagh, he was there with me" said Harry.
"Well, in that case you Eragon can tell us your story and then I would like to hear your story as well Murtagh, Harry and I would like to hear the reason of your stay here dwarf and for last Aria you will tell us your story since your ambush and subsequent capture" said the queen softly
Eragon began to tell the story since the moment the egg had appeared and sometimes he left Saphira to continue in what parts of their journey she remembered better and with every passing moment their incredulity increased especially as he recounted his part in resuing Aria and burning half of Gil'ead down. After he finished his story, Murtagh began recounting his life story and when he ended Harry could swear he saw some elves look at him in appreciation but mot kept their neutral expressions. When Harry's turn came he said that he would like to keep his story to himself and that was gracefully accepted from the queen although he understood they didn't like not knowing about him.
Then Aria's turn came and she recounted all what had happened with details, even her tortures. Harry's empathy warned him at the immense rage that the elves present were in and even Murtagh and Orik were enraged at her treatment albeit in a smaller degree. Afterwards some elves spoke to thanks Aria for not revealing her secrets and express their sympathy for her situations and Harry noticed the grateful looks every elf in the room were giving to Eragon and Harry. The queen then announced they would have a banquet and once the banquet started she ordered one of the guards to leave and the guard left immediately. Sensing a familiar magical signature, Harry approached the queen unnoticed by anyone.
"Is there any were-cat in here by any chance?" asked Harry maing the queen jump and grasp a hidden knife.
"It isn't very wise to sneak up on an elf" said the quen as she calmed down "and as a matter of fact there is one, how did you know?"
"I've meet one before and I wanted to meet him or her because they're fun to hang around with" said Harry smiling at seeing Saphira puff a small stream of smoke toward Bladgen and the elf's began to laugh.
"You find them amusing, most find them annoyingly cryptic" said the queen rasing an eyebrow.
"They don't know the true value of a good riddle" replied Harry.
"True and here she comes" said the queen gesturing at an approaching figure that seemed like a cross between a child and an old woman.
"Did someone call me?" asked the were-cat.
"Yes this young man claimed to have "felt" your presence" said the queen surprising the were-cat.
"Hello, what name can I call you by?" asked Harry cheerfully.
"Well you can call me Mod, what about you?" asked the were-cat.
"My name is Harry" replied Harry "do you know a were-cat going by the name of Solembum?"
"Yeah I have" replied Mod.
And so Harry continued to talk with the were-cat for the entire duration of the party until Islanzadi took them away to sow them their new rooms and awarded Eragon and Harry with a ring similar to Aren, proclaiming them Friends of the Elves. After that they all were given their rooms, Eragon, Murtagh and Aria were placed in the old accomadations of the Dragon Riders, with Eragon getting the old quarters of Vrael,- while Harry and Orik were both put in a tree house not very far from the tree house were the rest of their party was residing. Harry decided that he was going to visit Rhunon tomorrow, right after Eragon was to meet his new teacher but before he could fall asleep (trance-like state) he felt a massive flare of emotions and reckonizing the source of them he stood up from his bed and flew outside of the tree house and headed toward the source.