-BRISINGR-
THORN let out a whistle as the darkness settled on his senses. He hopped forward gingerly as the rain began to wet his hair.
Shoulders slouched, he walked through the graves.
The wind was nearly the color of pitch, and Thorn couldn't sense anything beyond his own thrum of magic.
With that said, his yellow eyes took in Sealed Elves tumbling about him, eviscerating one another as howls filled the air.
Thorn yawned, sidestepping two bellowing dark elves as they wrestled and stabbed each other with broken swords.
What's happening here? He shook hair away from the center of his face, lifting his nose. He could smell nothing, save for curdling blood that soaked the ground.
But-
He suddenly saw a flash of the long haired boy, similar in face to Murtagh but brown instead of black-
His nose honed in on Eragon's feeble residual ebb. Thorn could smell the magical currents of those around him, which unfortunately, made him the tracer.
Fortunately for you, the Dragon mused sardonically.
He could tell from Eragon's scent that he was weak. dying in fact.
Thorn had been right about the boy.
shortly after the fool had tried asking how old he was, Thorn spoke telepathically with Murtagh.
What's wrong with him? He doesn't have any control over his wellspring! Thorn queried, referring to the poorly maintained flow of Eragon's overflowing magic. Eragon was trained, of course. But Thorn could tell it was hasty, and almost cripplingly archaic.
Is he ready for this? I can see him dying within a reasonable amount of time if this is his level of skill.
"He'll die." Murtagh had said in response, privately communicating his misgivings mentally to a sniggering Thorn.
The Dragon hissed boredly, air whistling sharply from his fanged teeth.
"It would appear you've learned nothing all, then. Cheers." Thorn said to no one as he whipped on the heels of his boots, wearily eying Sealed as he weaved between them.
He had the innate skill to conceal himself from unassuming forces, or preoccupied and simple minded things.
While any novice mage would detect him instantly, it was a cheap trick that worked while among throngs of bodies.
He couldn't attack them,
or touch them for more than a seconds time without risking breaking the spell, but as long as he moved carefully, he was virtually unseen.
Thorn hopped over a dried up riverbed that separated the procession of headstones and bloodied leaves. Darkness was all around now, and even with his enhanced vision, it was hard for Thorn to see more than few meters ahead of himself.
He tentatively reached out with his magic once more, and found nothing but silence.
Morzan meant to teleport us together, and he had the capacity to do just that.
If I'm here, then it's likely that the others are separated as well. And if that's beyond a doubt of certainty, then it's more than a fair possibility that we've fallen into a trap.
Thorn closed his eyes as his nose lead him, curling underneath a jagged rock face that sat over a winding valley. The graves in this valley were arranged in a ritualistic symbol, a Laen Elf loosing an arrow into the skies above. However, Between pale stones that marked the dead, new blood fell.
But among that congealing red sea, Thorn could nearly taste the rattling breaths that crept from Eragon's body.
The sound of desperate war and violent death still were all that could be heard, his mind unbothered by the chanting laughs of the deranged berserkers that ripped muscle from bone as they cried.
He had been coy with Eragon about his age, but in truth his answer itself wasn't far off. In his short lifespan he had gone through numerous magical experiments to increase his power and his intellectual capacity far beyond that of his actual age.
His short existence had been mired with violence and death and blood- and due to this, it was the only thing he was accustomed to. Swords and battles- they brought nothing to him, not truly.
The Eldeena experiments that Galbatorix had used on him tore his mind and body apart, reforming him into a being that was on the cusp of maturity, not a hatching barely two years old.
Thorn's fist tightened slightly.
He knew Murtagh loved Galbatorix, and he knew that Galbatorix himself was a fair man and King. But he wasn't sure if he could forgive the King for the hell he endured, even if it was all for Murtagh.
He was alive, but he felt as if he had lost something, an innocence that he knew he would never know.
Thorn's eyes saw a gleam of silver armor among curling bodies of the dying and eerily still corpses. He approached carefully, curling around jutting spears that rose from the earth, held by cold hands that would never carry arms again.
He softly pulled bodies away from Eragon, careful not to make too much noise.
The boy's breathing was haggard.
Wounds cut the boy's face and body. Eragon's hair was doused in drying red blood, while chunks of red, organic matter matted between brown curls.
The boy's eyes were open. His pupils, the color of light wood, lay still and small, constricted as if tightened by rope.
Thorn stood over the body for what seemed like a lifetime.
He could help the boy. He knew that was the logical course to take. Right now, Eragon was the only ally he had.
But if I use my magic here, there's a chance that whoever is doing this will sense me.
Thorn furrowed his brows. He hadn't found Murtagh yet, and even if Eragon was revived without issue, could he trust the boy to stay alive until they regrouped with the others?
He had no communications, no Rider. Only a half dying boy.
Thorn knelt down, hating himself as he extended a finger to Eragon's nose. A vermillion stalk sprung from his skin, sprouting in a minuscule black rose.
The rose's petals shook, releasing a luscious fog that eagerly vented upwards into the boy's nostrils.
The cloudiness in Eragon's eyes melted as his pupils widened. His chest rose and fell normally, and Thorn winced as he saw Eragon's open wounds, slick with blood, open and close with each labored breath.
But he was conscious.
Eragon's eyes looked over him with dim familiarity, while the rose that Thorn sprouted slid back into a waiting finger.
He opened his mouth, but Thorn shook his head.
"We were separated. Morzan fell for a trap. I have no idea where the others are, and I can't sense them. More than likely they can't sense us either."
Eragon's face somehow grew even more dim behind his makeup of blood.
The young dragon, however, simply shrugged.
"I figured I'd tell you before you said anything."
The spell Thorn administered should heal Eragon enough so that he could at least walk. Thorn turned away from the boy. There were no sealed around- at least none that took interest in what he was doing.
The chaos and confusion wrought by whoever pulled them here was good in the sense it gave Thorn ample cover to sulk in the shadows.
Still, he was worried.
Turning back to face Eragon, he hoped the boy would recover soon. He had used magic- and it would be cruel if he had revived the boy, only to lead Eragon and himself to their deaths because they had been detected.
The boy's Rider blood did seem to quicken the healing, but it would still take time. Thorn frowned, almost apologetic for his thoughts about Eragon's weakness.
The child had suffered, just like he had.
"Vizcélia was right." A voice spoke.
It was gruff, as if the speaker had inhaled smoke as it exhumed from a churning chimney.
Thorn still faced Eragon. He touched the ground, allowing his roots to tunnel into the sick earth.
The ground was cursed, which weakened his magic. But he was able to produce a rose that broke dirt a few meters behind him, and conjured a small eye that blinked from ebony petals.
A sealed Elf stood not ten meters away, watching Thorn's back as it paced to-and -forth. It wielded two blades.
One was awash in flame, while another held a swirling cloud of gnats that routinely dived into the open fissures that wounded the arm that held it.
Blonde hair was tied into a tail that wrapped around an emaciated waist. Armor, surprisingly, did grace the Sealed's legs, but it was horridly rusted and filthy with blood and grime.
"She told me to wait when I found flesh, wait and more shall come to you." The elf said excitedly.
It stepped forward.
Thorn placed another hand to the ground as the being continued speaking, gradually mounting into a sprint.
"More flesh has come!" It howled excitedly. Thorn jumped as the being's flaming sword cut downwards, precariously close to Eragon's makeshift bed of corpses.
He turned, red hair billowing, as the Sealed Elf's sword rose, flames unaffected by pouring rain.
He offered the Sealed a handsome, wry smile.
"Vizćelia?" He repeated, the name tingling his lips. The Sealed Elf looked at him, confused as a rose vine clawed from the earth. It wrapped itself around the Sealed's neck, following Thorn's programmed ordered when he had sprouted it.
The Elf swayed, dropping its weapons as it desperately clawed for breath. Thorn watched impassively, cold eyes unblinking until white foam began to froth from the Sealed's mouth.
The Dark Elf's eyes grew wide as Thorn approached, raising a hand that grew black talons from white nails.
"A beautiful name," Thorn said as he reached downwards, thrusting his hand deeply into a fleshy chest until he could feel the last beats of a punctured heart.
He heard movement behind him, and smiled as he saw Eragon stumble to his knees, breathing heavily as he vomited on all fours.
Eragon looked up at him from a veil of ruined hair.
"A trap?" He rasped.
Thorn wiped his hands clean while stepping over the body of the Elf he killed. The two weapons- a flaming sword and one afflicted by bugs.. he figured those could be useful to him, and collected them. A bed of roses erupted below the weapons, and they sunk into the flowerbed as if it was a deep pool of darkened water.
"Yes. I'm not surprised that they knew we would be coming. If what I have been told is true, then Oromis is too powerful to be left to die. What I am bothered by is-"
"The fact that Morzan was deceived." Eragon finished harshly.
Thorn scoffed in humor at the boy as the human curled himself into a kneeled position.
"We're dealing with something or someone with enough magical talent to be able to throw Morzan off guard.." Thorn said.
The name of Vizćelia chanted within Thorn's skull.
Is that who's behind all this?
The dragon shook his head. That didn't matter. All that mattered now was finding Murtagh.
He looked at the boy.
"Can you walk now?" He asked impatiently.
Eragon nodded, stepping forward gingerly.
Thorn smiled weakly.
"Great. Let's be off then." He said. He wasn't sure where they were going, but they couldn't just do nothing. Thorn had been able to vaguely sense Eragon, and even then the boy was far away.
If they walked, then maybe they could locate the others, or
Die, As Murtagh would've said. Thorn smiled at the thought of Murtagh, turning to Eragon with a scrunched nose.
"You smell." The dragon said as he lead the wounded boy deeper into hell.
-BRISINGR-
NEXT CHAPTER: MORZAN'S TEARS