Ugh, this took forever. Oh well. I realized after posting the previous chapter that this story has now exceeded 20,000 words, which makes it the longest work I have ever written! Yay! I hope everyone reading this will continue to enjoy it, and thank you as always to those who comment. I appreciate it immensely.

Calarel, Corrin decided, was an exceptional cook. The midday meal was in the elvish style, no meat and mostly composed of fruit and vegetables, but delicious all the same. Corrin participated little in the conversation, engrossed in his food. There was no table large enough to hold them all, so the Riders took their bowls and plates and sat on the flat, sunwarmed pavers outside, while the three dragons who had gone down to meet the Eldunari sat around them, and Thuviel, Galzra, and Shruikan cavorted in the sky above.

"So, Murtagh," Eragon said, as most of them were finishing their meals. "What have you and Thorn been doing in the north all this time? I remember you saying something about building a castle…"

"Well," Murtagh shrugged, "Castle-building turned out to be a slightly more complex process than I anticipated. Thorn and I flew north, to the lands around the mouth of the Bay of Fundor. There're a few scattered villages up there; a couple Urgal, a couple more human. Once we figured out how hard it was to clear enough land for a castle in those thick woods, we started looking for an area that was already open, and by and by we ran across a town with the ruins of a hillfort on the outskirts."

Corrin noticed that Leah and Varog had broken off from watching the young dragons in the sky to listen closer.

"They thought of themselves as more of a tribe than just a village; their leader was a chief, like with the Urgals or the Wandering Tribes," Murtagh continued. "You can imagine they were less than pleased with a dragon descending on them, but I managed to convince them that neither Thorn nor I meant them any harm. The chief was very courteous, and as it turned out they'd been meaning to rebuild the thing for a while and never got around to it. Once I assured them repeatedly that Thorn could get food for himself, they were perfectly happy to provide food for me and shelter for both of us in exchange for work on the fort."

Eragon chuckled. "I imagine if they'd thought they had to feed Thorn, that conversation might have gone differently."

A ripple of laughter ran around the group. "Aye," Murtagh agreed amiably, "but fortunately we had other options. It was a good place for us, actually; the townsfolk were a little wary of Thorn, but they were all very generous. We stayed there, oh, a couple winters, at least. It was cold."

Very cold, Thorn added. Sometimes it snowed even on the edges of summer.

"Ugh," Leah interjected, shuddering at the thought. Corrin couldn't help but agree, thinking of the contrast with the endless heat of his homeland.

Varog snorted. "You southerners have no fortitude. You think a little breath of autumn is the depths of winter."

"I assure you," Murtagh replied wryly, "I was cured of any such illusions by my first winter there. To be fair, it was a decent incentive to get some sort of walls and roof up."

It sounds like a good place for you both, Saphira commented. Why leave?

Murtagh pulled a face. "Well, it's a bit of a long story-"

Thorn interrupted him with a snort. No it isn't.

Murtagh waved the comment off. "Ignore him. It was a combination of factors; we mentioned the cold, of course, and game in the mountains was running low from Thorn's hunting, and…"

The chief's daughter fell in love with him.

Eragon's jaw dropped. "No!"

Yes.

Corrin clapped both hands over his mouth to keep from laughing. Behind him, amusement rolled off Kiera in waves, making it even harder for him to restrain himself.

Murtagh glowered at the entire group, as Eragon cackled and everyone else tried to pretend they weren't laughing. "It is not. Funny," he seethed, but the flush on his face and neck gave away his embarrassment. No one paid him any mind.

Thorn hummed thoughtfully. Of course nothing happened, but the chief was very unhappy with the idea that the strange dragonrider was plotting to steal away his daughter, and we decided it was best to move on.

Just like that? Kiera asked, sounding surprised. I would have expected more drama.

There might have been a few pitchforks involved in our departure, Thorn conceded.

"In other words," Murtagh grumbled, "they ran us out of town."

Leah shook her head. "That sounds like quite the thorny problem." Corrin smiled down at his food, then looked up as he realized the joke. Varog rolled his eyes and cuffed Leah on the back of the head, but when she looked up again, she caught Corrin's eye and winked. He stifled a grin and looked down once more.

"Anyways," Murtagh growled when the group's mirth had mostly died down, "by that point I was thoroughly sick of snow, so we decided to head back to civilization, and eventually that led us here."

"Did you finish the castle?" Varog wanted to know.

Murtagh nodded "Most of it. Still needed a couple adjustments, but the basic structure was solid."

Any further conversation was halted by overlapping roars from above. In the sky, Galzra and Thuviel spiralled haltingly down towards the Court, trying to extract wings, limbs, and tails from the tangle that seemed to have resulted from them crashing into each other. Above them, a winged black shadow balanced in the sky and watched their antics.

Saphira growled low in her throat and got to her feet. That will be enough, she called out. Come down, we have things do do.

Yes, Ebrithil, came two replies. Shruikan just tilted his wings and wheeled down to the ground.

Corrin got to his feet, still looking at Thuviel and Galzra as they finally detangled themselves. "How did Shruikan even get them to run into each other like that?" he mused to himself.

"Shruikan has his mother's talent for aerial maneuvering," Leah answered. "He can do harder acrobatics than either of our dragons. Thuviel is still the fastest, though," she amended with a touch of pride.

Varog inclined his great horned head in agreement. "Thuviel is fastest, Shruikan is most agile, and Galzra has the greatest strength."

Leah raised an eyebrow. "Or so Varog would have you believe."

"Is true," the Urgal grunted.

For now, Saphira chided them. For all you know, Kiera may displace your dragons in any or all of those categories.

"We will see," Eragon said. "It's about time we got on with our afternoon anyway, wouldn't you say? After all, we aren't going to assess Corrin and Kiera's capabilities by just sitting here."

Corrin grinned nervously, as Kiera got to her feet behind him.