"What do we do now? We have a little over half of what they do, and they are far more prepared than we are." Alymay whispered.
"What we need is time, and I know just how to get it." Eragon stated. "We need a diversion large, and long enough that we can give everyone enough time. If they were to, lets say randomly combust, it might slow them?"
She glanced over at him wondering what in the word he could possibly be thinking of. "Is your brain rattled? Perhaps you need to stop being a fire bug and notice were in trouble!" Alymay allways had a temper and when she did not under stand things.
"A fire that is capable of stoping them. If they just happened to all catch on fire I am most certain that it can help us." So he swung around and climbed down the ladder into the house. They watched as he went to the gates and slipped outside. They could not see nor hear him from where he went but over half the enemy begame one large flame before the gate opened again. A tired rider steped back inside the semi safety of the walls. He looked up to them and winked. From there he ran back into town.
"What was he thinking! That trick was compleatly insane. Leaving the walls just to burn the enemy." She was not one to keep feelings hiden. Even if she tried to it wouldn't work. They allways some how managed to appear on her face. She sat up on the house and went to climb down when a majestic dragon landed on the roof. She scampered back wards in time to avoid the tale.
"I'm sorry, I hope your okay." Eragon slid from the dragons back and into the hatch on the roof leading inside. He came back out moments later with a tiny blonde girl clinging to his shoulders.
"Carilisia!(car-leh-siya)" Alymay lept to her feet. "Are you okay?"
"Oh hello Alymay, I'm just fine." The little girl smiled and climbed onto the over sized dragon and straped herself into the sadle and Eragon climbed up behind her and they flew back off into town.
"What does that one's brain think it is doing! Bringing a seven year old any where by an animal like that!" She had already begun to dislike Eragon. She hardly ever liked anyone truth be told, but if she did she was loyal to them until the end.
"Ah don't worry little one. That dragon is safe enough."
"I ment the boy." Alymay climbed down into the house while the old woman cackled at the joke.
Alymay reached the bottom of the house and walked to the Eastern gate her head blazing in thought. She had not realised where she was going until she walked right into the local black smith. "Careful Alymay, your going to break your arm again if you keep walking into things and people." He helped her back off of the ground where she had fallen.
"I'm sorry Petey, and thank you for the reminder. That broken arm was one of the most tedious times to endure. Well I had better be on my way." And with that she waved good bye to him and kept on moving. When she reached the Eastern wall she noticed the final tale of one of the secret squads dogs flick behind the door. 'So they finaly went out to fight. Good Bonnie will be easier to talk to once she had been able to slay a few Urgals.' With her thouths to her self she noticed the gate was left slightly open.
She sprang forward and snaped it closed just in time. Three Urgals had just made their way over in attempt to enter as it seemed. She drew her bow and hand three arows ready. One on the string and the other two resting in her loose fingers. She climbed the over seeing ladder and shot the three down. While she took the time to shoot them, their own archers took the time to shoot her. Lucky for her their aim was horrid. However the cought her with an arrow just through the mussle between her colar bone and shoulder. She slid down the ladder to hide her self from view and over looked the wound. She saw Petey about to enter his house down the street right at the end. She called his name but he hadn't heared her because he went back inside his house.
She cursed under her breath when she heared urgals on the other side. She wasn't really in the condition to shoot with her arm in this shape. She reversed direction and climbed back up the ladder. She had another three arows ready by the time she reached the top. She drew one, looked over the edge and shot all three of them in three seconds. She ducked back behind the wall just in time. She pulled the arrow out of her and tightend in pain.
She shook the feeking off and readyed another three arrows. She loosed two this time before she had been shot. This time right in the chest. She fell back over the ladder and hit the ground hard. She spit the blood out of her mouth and lept back to her feet. She would not be beaten this easily. She took her last three arrows and climbed the ladder. The enemy had thought they had killed her and were not ready for the first two, but by the third they were ready. They released an arrow just as her last one left the twanging sound from her bow. It struck her in her stomach and launched her backwards back to the ground. She curled into a ball from the pain. The two arrows still in her body made it difficult to move, and to suck air into her ever resisting lungs and the darkness she feared more than anything close around her. She fell into memories of her past.
"Come Aly dear, I want to show you something."
"What is it father? A new dolly or pony?"
"No my sweat daughter something much more delightful. It's the family weapons. They have been in this family since your great grand fathers time. He made over half of them him self."
"I like this one." Her small child like fingers reached up and traced the outline of a dark wood bow. It had carvings down the side in the most splendid pattern. They were set in a deep gold with rubies out lining the two ends in down ward spirals.
"That one was allways his favorite as well." Her father smiled at her and huged her tight. "If you practice hard with your archery lessons I'll give that bow to you.
Now as her twisted form lay in the dust her fingers held tightly to a black bow with gold and ruby designs.
Thirty feet away in his office the black smith was reading him self for battle. He grabed his war axe from the shelf and walked out side. The second he closed the door he heard the unmistakeable sound of a body hiting the ground. He turned to the East to watch Alymay's twisted from lie there. He moved quickly and silently to her. He felt her pulse. There was the softest beat there. He picked her up and turned around and ran back into town. He brought her to the tent made for wounded people.
"Margy, MARGY!" And elderly woman steped into the tent from the other side.
"How lovely, Alymay just had to beat everyone else in the race to hurt them selvs. Lay her here and place her weapon there. If you can get it out of her fingers that is." The woman had indicated the bow Alymay still clung to.
Petey layed her down and nodded to the woman. "I'm off to where I found her. They must have more there if she was on the ground." With that he left the tent and ran back to the place he had found her.
"Aly you've gotten so well at targeting that bow. You haven't missed the center since you were little. I'm very proud of you."
"Thank you father." She ran to him and wraped her arms around him. "Wheres mama? Isn't she with you?"
"Um Aly your mother is still very sick." He put her back onto the ground after his tight embrace. He kneeled to he was at eye level with her. "She may not come home for a long time. She needs to stay in the city so she is closer to better doctors." He reached up and brushed on of her long locks of light brown hair from her face. "Don't worry, I'll allways be here."
Her happy memories turned to nightmares. "Father don't leave me! Don't die." A thirteen year old child clung to her father. "father don't leave me. Papa please?" She used her old nick name for him from when she was very little. "Please Papa don't go." She held onto him with tears running down her face. "Please?" But four men came and led her away from him. "Papa!" They had to lift her away from the scene.
Next she re-lived her brothers death.
She was surrounded by lots of people. All of them gave her their respect but what did it matter? That didn't bring her brother, father, or mother back. Now she was alone. All but for her best friend in the world, Arya. "Arya I feel as if every one is leaving me. They are all closing their eyes and taking the journey to the quite lands leaving me behind. I feel so lost without them."
"It's okay Aly, I wont leave you, if anything you will be the one to leave me." Arya wraped her arm around her best friends shoulders and they leaned into one another. "The world will bet a better place. I just hope you can keep your spirits up long enough to see the place I speek of."
Darkness followed. She only moved when they extracted the arrows from her body and then it was in response to pain. She slept the rest of the day, and the rest of that night. What she had done would later be known as the Nine Arrow Set Back. Her nine arrows had saved many lives from being ended.