The Heroes

The Hero sits upon the hillside, and lets his mind fill the world.

Little one, says his mind's home, you are lonely.

Without you, always.

But no, he realises. Her mind is not there. It is just his, remembering.

In that strange state, between wakefulness and slumber, his mind wonders.

His mind first comes upon a group of Imperial soldiers. They sit around their campfire, singing softly, and to their surprise the song is familiar. One of home, in the Spine, of a warm hearth after a day in the fields. Of laughter, and love, and loss.

The words end, and they sit, watching the flames, eyes leagues away.

'Do you remember Brom?' one of them asks. 'Storyteller Brom?'

The Hero pauses-and his mind floats away, leagues and years in the past. From one home, to another.

He comes to another place, one hundred hundred yards away in the woods. Two sentries share a bottle, they talk and laugh, and it's only when one of them mentions 'the usurper' that he realises one to be a Surdan, the other an Imperial.

'Tomorrow, Bill,' one was saying, 'we'll probably be stabbing each other up again.'

The other nods. 'Like as not. I'll look for the wine if I see you down.'

They laugh.

Like Oromis' ants, his mind continues to float among them. The night is long. And the island, for the first time in a century, teams with life.

A group of Varden, hooded and cloaked, huddle in a cave beneath a tree. They too sing one of Brom's songs, almost whispering it into the night .Theirs' is of defiance, of riders with broken swords and shattered shields. The hero, although the Forsworn fly at her from all sides, never gives up the fight. She stands resolute, and bids her wounded dragon cast her into the abyss, and fall at her side, rather than be taken alive. Claws red with the blood of her foes, the dragon obeys.

As they finish, they sharpen their knives. One of them's spotted a campfire nearby, almost unguarded. Time to give it a visit.

Another.

The Roman commander, and his mistress, sit under his cloak, and their hearts are full of joy to see her safe and happy. It is a fate that few can share after the past five days.

Certainly, the commander does not. He looks at his sand table, at the ever diminishing lines where the Varden hold out, and the ever larger patch where the Empire holds sway.

The Varden's other officers have fallen asleep behind him, having told him that there's no sense in tiring himself out now. But he stays awake, and he looks at the map, but nothing seems to come to him.

'Where's the fleet?' she mutters.

'Ours'? Somewhere, among the seas, with a squadron in pursuit, and our bloody dragon. The Surdan? I can't say, it's somewhere between bloody here and bloody Aberon, and as like as not in Imperial hands, and you've asked that twelve times tonight, so shut the-'

'I'm sorry, alright! I was just-'

'I know. I know. By Hercules, I know, and I'm sorry that I can't tell you more, but… by Hercules,' and at this point the commander bursts into laughter . 'My first command was supposed to be a jaunt into bloody Dacia to dust up some barbarians. I wasn't-we weren't-none of this was supposed to happen!'

She looks tired too. 'But you're here, and it's happening. Come, we'd know if Surda had surrendered, they'd have told us. Since it hasn't, that means the navy's coming. We just need to hold out a few more days.'

When she woke up that morning, her gums had bled, and she had fallen sick with fever. The island was killing her, as it was killing them all. Yet again, the Hero had had to heal them. Every day here weakened him, sapped his reserves.

(Their mind wonders to the freshly dug grave, mostly filled with wretched labourers, and more than a few of the wounded. Healing magic was being more strictly rationed now. Roman butchery was increasingly not up to the job.)

For five days, they had fought in this forest. Five days, since the Empire had taken the beaches.

It had been horrific.

He let his mind wonder, slowly, from the beaches and upwards. Here, imperial soldiers hung in little groups, caught in the branches. Their pikeblocks had foundered in the woods, and the arrows had stuck into their necks, their bellies, into all sides.

There, a captured Varden soldier, mutilated, thrown into a hole. The conscripts who had done it were not by nature cruel men, not usually, but they were terrified and a long way from home.

(Alone in a glade, his horse picketed by a folly, the Disgraced Captain of Horse draws his sabre, and practices his moulinettes. The blade seems to flicker in the moonlight. His eyes, too, are a way away, but just a few days ago. He would get the rider this time. He has vowed it, by the graves of his fallen men. This time. The blade twirls in the moonlight.)

("This one,'" said Their voice, "shows spirit.")

They were watching. Of course They were.

So the Hero, wearily, tried to explain again.

'He is from a nation,' he explained, 'that is one of our allies. We fight with him, to restore the riders, against the Usurper.'

("Do you? Because, as We see it, the King still has more Riders than you do. Indeed, he has more eggs.")

'He levelled your castle, killed your kin!'

("And it has been a century since last you remembered to greet us. A century is a long time. He has at least tried to cultivate the Order in the manner to which they are accustomed.")

The old argument. The Hero had had no notion that a mind, left in darkness to brood for a century, would be so obstreperous; but, apparently, it was.

It was an argument that was killing them. He wished that someone wiser-Brom, perhaps-could be having it. But of all the people on that island, only he could be telling them.

'Look, we've allied ourselves with a former Rider-people dedicated to restoring the Riders! Does this not-'

("And to slavers, and to Urgals, and to Dwarves. You continue to kill folk, many of whom bear you no ill will. How are you restoring the peace of the riders?")

'Sacrifices must be made,' the Hero said.

(He could feel, overhead, the crows gathering.)

("You seem troubled.")

A group of Roman soldiers, standing by the cliff.

Two sacks, at their feet.

'They who were with us, are with us no more.'

An older man, leaning on a cane, addressing the rest. The tears have stopped rolling.

'They marched to war in Dacia, and they marched expecting to fight there again. Instead, they came here, and they were with us like fucking brothers. First into every fight, last out of it. I… this sounds like a bloody play, forgive me, I'm not an orator. I'm a soldier. These men were good at that. The best.'

Nods.

'But by Hercules, my lads, they took their wine like bloody Germans. And that's how I'll always remember them, in the end, snoring into their cups at every tavern, every army camp, every, every ditch in every roadside from here to the Subura. The Twins.'

'The Twins!' Somehow, the soldiers have wine. (It was, the Hero had learned, a trick that soldiers master more powerful than any magic in Alagaesia.) They pour it out, drink their health.

(More than a few choke, cough, try to ignore the blood on their hands. The sickness of this island is pervasive. With the Imperial army below, it scarcely mattered.)

'Now, lets get them hauled up to the main lot, the dragon's gonna burn them soon. Then we'll be rid of them forever.'

'I am troubled,' the Hero said, 'for our fallen.'

("The enemy are more numerous than you, are they not? It so follows that, for you to win, you must kill more of their soldiers than they of yours'.")

'No, no, I could have saved them! Ours'! Had we-I-we been there…'

Silence.

'You don't mean to let the other side get them, do you? The egg-breakers?'

Silence.

("Whichever side we see fit, or neither. It is all the same to us…")

The trees no longer have leaves. All is bare, stark.

(He realises that his mind has wondered to where the Empire had tried to burn them out of the woods with dragonfire. Thorn had stomped up, and blown a gout at a suspected Varden position. The Imperials had cheered, then-but they had not appreciated that, whilst fire was all very well, all it took was a simple gust of wind to blow it right back at them-right into the tightly knit ranks of the regiment they had poised to charge. They did not try again.)

It starts to rain.

His mind continues to rove, considering Their words.

Archers wrap their strings in leather, to keep them dry. Officers crowd into their tents; the ranks shiver under their cloaks. Most, save for a few Varden scouts, try to sleep.

Whichever they saw fit.

Come on, Hero. No mentor. No dragon. Just you, your sword, your god-like magical power (precious little of that left, he was all through the rubies.) Think.

(The old mess-tent of the Surdan cavalry; empty spaces at their table, and at the blankets where their officers would sleep.

The new field hospital, full.)

For them. Think.

How to prove onself worthy to a dragon?

'Think, Pulcher. Think. How to scratch a few more days out of this mess before we go full Leonidas?'

Gnaepia was asleep. Warm. Comforting.

'We have a few strong positions. We're pushed out of the lowlands, but the Heights are still ours'. The woods. Always the woods. We have no contact with the Fleet. They can't burn us out. I don't know how much magic we have, to hades with them, but I'm guessing not a lot. So lets think. One problem at a time.'

Strenghten the defences. Always. Keep digging, getting rocks, laying stakes,t raps, everything they could. There was only one path up into the top of the volcano, already fortified, as a last holdout. Clear fields of fire for the artillery. Pull back into the mountain. Eragon was reluctant to let them in, but to hell with him. (But the Imperials would inevitably follow, and find the eggs. Damn.)

Arm the labourers? Unlikely to work. More than a few had fled to the Imperial lines already. Naturally, this being The Empire, and thus possessed of a lust for death beyond that of the most fanatical arena-watcher, they were bloodily executed and displayed for all the Varden to see 'as befits all traitors'. By the gods, this country…

Still, it did not speak volumes for their morale. And they had precious little to arm them with.

But what choice did he have? Reserves were tapped. The cavalry fought on foot. He and his staff officers had had to step into line that morning due to an absence of anything else. Should he have done this earlier? Perhaps, but by the gods… worth a try.

Now. Arming other people.

Arming other people.

What other people…

The mountain.

Arming people at the mountain.

He jumps to his feet, and starts to pace.

Who is in the mountain?

What, in the mountain, could be armed, and bring terror to the enemies of the Varden?

What, in the mountain, would have a vested sympathy with their cause?

His love of animals, his need to save his command, his love of the theatrical, the situation-it all clicks together into a plan so ludicrous, so utterly farcical, so far-fetched, that it couldn't possibly work-indeed, Eragon had probably thought of it already, it couldn't work-

but why not?

Gnaepia stirs. 'You're up,' she murmurs.

She screws up her face, takes a closer look. 'And you're smiling.'

Pulcher realised that, for the first time in a long while, he was. Rainfall and all.

'I have just thought of the most marvellous joke, and I need to tell Eragon. Where did he say he would be going?'

Gnaepia blinked.

'I knew you'd have a plan. The top of that bloody volcano.'

'Of course. Where else? Come along, old girl, lets go…'

Two minds, approaching rapidly.

Both are protected, but their signature is obvious.

(How does one prove oneself worthy to a dragon?)

Both armed. But all is well, he is with the army now.

And he awakes, to feel water, freezing water, down the back of his neck.

And a man shaking him.

'Now, sorry Shadeslayer, I didn't mean to wake you,' a man was saying, 'but this is quite urgent. Besides, I'm the commander, I do what I want. Could you just give me a potted history of your entire order, including recruitment, training and upbringing, in about fifteen minutes? I have a speech to write…'