THE TRUTH IN A NAME

David had little doubt that Arya had more than one way to use magic to conceal their traces, he was even pretty sure that Eragon had been able to do the very same in the first book, when he went ahead thanks through the plot-armour and little else.

Even so, while he was aware that as a fox, nobody would scrutinize his tracks too closely, the Shade and his Urgals had been able to spot the foxes that he had left on the lookout. Not only that, but one thing is knowing that your target is crossing a certain area in the wilderness, actually finding it is a whole different kettle of fish. The one-eyed Rider had the stark suspicion that there were spells that the Shade was capable of using to track his targets, and given what little David knew of the magic available to that creepy being, he couldn't really rule it out.

Once more, as his paws ate kilometre after kilometre while he followed his instinct and kept pointing west, he reasoned and speculated about the magic of Alagaësia: he didn't have access to it until after the hatchling had marked him, and even then, he hadn't made significant progress about discovering his 'inner energy', or 'life force' or whatever that the mages used to power their magic.

Granted, it happened four days before, so it was to be expected that he wouldn't discover every secret now available to him immediately, but even then, he wasn't some random human that had never heard of magic before, he expected to be able to figure out... something more about himself, despite the little time available for self-inspection he had had.

His mind felt freer, for lack of a better term, no matter how unreliable his own perception of himself was, and he had been quite freaked out at the thought of remaining stuck into the horse he used to distract the Shade, drowning his own fear in the urgency of the moment. Even so, while he had an instinctive way of understanding how to use his newly freed mind, he still had no idea how it made the slightest sense.

As he hopped over a particularly tall root and sneaked through the thinning underbrush, he found himself once more contemplating the effects, undeniable as they were, that the dragon-bond had on himself. Besides having experienced that he could now project his mind in an area around himself limited only by the strength of his self-awareness, use his superior brain-power to subdue simpler beings, and all-around perceive what he supposed was life in animals, as well as living in a constant state of legilimencing everything around himself unless he forced himself not-to, he knew that he would eventually be able to use magic as the people in Alagaësia could.

That, more than many things, was confusing, since his own ability to turn himself into a fox and back went against the few rules of magic that he had been able to remember or infer. In the Potter Universe, magic revolved around the concept of identity and souls: a greater understanding granted a greater control, and that was it. Oh, it had its loopholes and exceptions, but everything could be explained without ignoring the fundamentals aspects that he had painstakingly found out during his, in hindsight hollow, life.

That he could exist in Alagaësia capable of something that openly defied the base principles of magic told him one thing: either he was carrying within himself a shard of the past world he had been in, and said shard was still capable of creating some sort of bubble around his identity where the Potter Universe' Rules of Magic applied, or, far more likely and way less headache-inducing, the people in Alagaësia hadn't even started to scratch the surface of what magic actually was.

He would be able to understand more once he figured out how to use magic himself, but he remembered that the strength of the body limited the power that one could exercise over the world, Ancient Tongue or not. That was why a random mage with a deep understanding of the gold's Name couldn't simply will it out of thin air. That possibility would have made for a vastly different world, for sure.

Why would the power of one's body have anything to do with magic? That was the part that he couldn't understand. He could get around to accepting that in Alagaësia people could be born with some sort of absurd 'magic core' that behaved like a muscle and that was heavily influenced by one's health, it could make sense in a dozen of different ways just from the top of his head, but muscles and ligaments had nothing in common with the ability to reshape reality with a bunch of words, willpower and 'life force', which still was an idiotic concept.

Busy in his musings, and keeping a regular if quick pace, he didn't realize that he had been relying more and more on his body's ability to move without his conscious input. A fox doesn't think about each limb as it moves, nor it requires to constantly check the sun to be sure to be on the right track, but... David stopped to drink from a small course of water as he considered his own actions.

Foxes don't have the equivalent of a GPS in their minds. He thought, only to perceive a slow but constant satisfied purring echo through his bond with the hatchling.

He blinked, focusing on the dragon, which had apparently been sharing his body while his mind was rambling about the inner workings of magic, helping to steer him lightly as he hadn't been paying attention to where he was going.

He knew, no, he felt, as his mind ran through his memories of the day-long run, that he had kept pointing west with unerring precision.

I guess I've run enough. He thought, turning human once more.

With a practised movement, he opened the Iron Trunk that he had placed on the ground, climbing down in it in short order, finding Arya getting to her feet from a nook among the roots of a desert ironwood tree, where, from the flashes of appreciation inside the hatchling memories, she had been scratching David's scaly companion while doing her best to humour Raven's obsession with riddles, which admittedly was suffering a bit from her still limited vocabulary in Alagaësia's common tongue.

While Arya's looks had increased significantly since before his run-shift, and her sporting a rested face, David could tell, from the iron-clad will that held her mind together, that she was forcing herself to keep to her duties instead of doubling back and mounting an assault over the Shade.

David exchanged a nod with the grief-stricken elf, but he refrained from offering words of comfort, what did he know of her pain? How could whatever left his mouth help her? And they kind of knew what they got into by running around with the most prized possession stolen from the most powerful evil fucker that this world has ever seen. He cynically pointed out to himself as the hatchling climbed on his shoulder, from where she could observe whatever David set himself up to.

He had a quick bite in his room while the dragon tried to steal his food from him, before quietly impressing trough his bond with the beautiful creature that she had to remain in the forest floor, and capturing one of the chickens that he let free from the henhouse to earn her dinner.

He remained focused on the hatchling with his mind until he perceived her stalk through the tall grass towards where she heard the telltale chuckling of a hen, before leaving the Iron Trunk and turning into a fox after having secured his own home to his neck.

David ignored the jokes that Fleur would have made if she saw him being carried around like some kind of puppy, focusing instead on the constant lull of the elf carrying him ad absurd speeds across the mountain forest.

David was awoken by a few words from Arya, who had set him on the ground and was busy breathing heavily, hands on her knees, after having spent every ounce of energy she had left to manage the crossing of the Anora river, which was born out of countless streams that were collected on the Spine, growing together and spilling forth from the Igualda Falls, considered the real birthplace of the great course of water that sped south only to double back north of Utgard and flow towards the North Sea.

We're already here? He projected against the walls surrounding Arya's consciousness once he had a minute or two to realize that the river at their backs was the Anora.

The affirmative answer echoed against his mind without words, making him nod thoughtfully. "I thought we would take longer." David commented as he turned human, quickly opening the Iron Trunk and leading the way down, greeting the hatchling in what hadn't had the time to grow into a routine quite yet, considering that after Arya's run during the first night, his following shift, and the elf's last sprint, they were already relatively close to their destination.

"The village is up the river, stay off the road." Arya instructed him as they both dug into their meal. It was a great thing for the elf, while David, mindful of his running duty, simply swiped some ham away from the hatchling, distractedly playing with it as if in a competition.

"We should steal some chickens from there, or the dragon will literally eat me out from my home." he commented playfully. Less than a week old, the hatchling had proven itself a voracious eater, already gaining a third or more of her initial length, and promising to keep up the trend given the two chickens she had eaten while Arya run.

"Once we find the man you've seen, we'll be able to plan further." Arya commented, "But I'm guessing that your companion will need to leave before she gets stuck in the hatch." she added with a shadow of a smile, "We wouldn't wish her to be stuck.".

Mercifully not communicating the images that Arya' words suggested to the hatchling, David focused on another thing. What kid of third rate wizard did she think he was? "How do you think I brought the trees and the henhouse that you see inside? The trunk's entrance is flexible. The only limitation is given from the dimension of this floor. For something to get stuck...It should taller than 30 meters, and the width goes around 15 meters."

"Meters?" Arya asked as she bit a peach, knowingly ignoring and not-thinking about what he meant by a flexible entrance, yet another example of how skewed the newly christened Rider's perspective on what was obvious and what wasn't entailed.

"A measure of length. Along 3 feet? Something like that."

"Why must something be under 30 meters tall?" she wondered as she converted the measures in her mind.

"Because..." David sighed, how to explain it? He had no idea what these people knew or didn't about the space-time bending properties of gravity, and the roughly medieval setting didn't inspire exactly thrust in their more science-oriented knowledge, to be honest, he had too learned the bare minimum he could get away with back in the Potterverse. There had been just so much to do with magic, that once he had grasped the basis that allowed him to manipulate the effects generated by Gravity, he dropped the field entirely.

He extracted a napkin from one of his leather coat's pockets, unfurling it with a snap of the wrist before forming a ring of sorts with the thumb and the finger of his free hand. Once he placed the cloth over it, he pinched the centre of the ring he formed, dragging down the napkin and forming a rough 'well': "We are currently sitting on one side of this well, if you started running in one direction, you would return to the starting point after roughly... 2xpix30meters... 188 meters."

"We're... sticking to a wall?" she frowned, studying his little demonstration with more than a little scepticism, which caused David to bristle briefly.

Perceiving the irritation of her companion, the hatchling ket out a ball of black smoke from her nostrils, eyeing in annoyance the she-elf. To avoid the drama of the young dragon, David was quick to steer the topic in a safer direction: "It's a bit more complex than that, but now It's my turn to go. I'll just need to run upstream, yes?"

At the absent nod from the elf, which was busy eyeing the hatchling as she tried to cling to her Rider, trying to keep him from leaving, David started walking upstairs, conveying once more his feelings of calm-satisfaction-almost there that managed to convince the little dragon to listen to him, if only because he had bribed her with a thorough scratching of the scales under her chin.

Moving as a fox, David took to the underbrush, keeping his ears to the ground and his eye focused on the ground, not eager to fall into a trap of sorts. Who knew what the people in medieval times would do to him? Eat him? Not that they were likely to, if he managed to almost take over an Urgal that was under the control of a Shade, he felt reasonably sure that he could divert the attention he would raise in the humans of the village, once he reached it.

His mind trickled in the connection he shared with the hatchling, returning to the last problem they had been facing: finding her a name.

What about Meridia? Lady of Infinite Energies, the Bright Lady, the Strict but Fair Arbiter of Inner Luminance, the Sunfire, the Radiant One, the Keeper, the Lady of Light and the Prince of Life? he thought, immediately withholding a sigh when the answer from the hatchling appeared in his mind's eye as a snap of teeth.

That's a no, then. he hopped over a root, quickly moving north and keeping himself on track.

Are you sure?

A smouldering gaze of sapphire eyes appeared in his mind's eye with a feeling of expectations not met.

The one-eyed fox with a strange oval mark upon his left brow sighed. Azura, the Queen of Dawn and Dusk? And before you say no, she also known as Azura of the Crimson Gate, the Mother Soul, Moonshadow, Mother of the Rose, Queen of the Night Sky, and the She Who Sits at the Precipice, was a Daedric Prince whose sphere is dawn and dusk, the magic in-between realms of twilight as well as mystery and magic, fate and prophecy, and vanity and egotism.

For a couple of minutes, David observed with amusement as the hatchling rolled in the grass of his trunk first floor, thinking about the images he remembered regarding the names he offered, only to ultimately discard them along with the name, even if, in that occasion, the refusal came with a subtle sense of encouragement to not give up, accompanied with a smug satisfaction born out of seeing him scramble to figure out an appropriate name.

He kept up the exchange with the hatchling, stopping to encourage her as she sneaked through the tall grass towards where she had spotted a rooster David had freed from the henhouse.

The hours trickled reasonably fast even as he trudged through the underbrush, not meeting anyone along the road, not that he expected to, and by the time the sun disappeared behind the tall mountains that he was running in the shadow of, he reached a human settlement.

The buildings, if that deserved such a name, were simply built, even if they had been clearly created to last. Wood walls and straw roofs, with only a few of the houses sporting a proper chimney. With a twist, the fox returned to human shape, David's mind already roaming across the area, delicately shifting inside the first mind he had found, stimulating it discretely with less than a whisper: Brom.

Confused by the direction her thoughts had suddenly took, the woman quickly banished the image of ...above his white beard, a proud eagle nose hooked over his mouth and dominated his face... and returned to her duties, that for the time being involved scrubbing the floor with water and ashes.

David blinked, fixing the image of the man he had been looking for in his mind. He walked across the land, trying to divert the attention of the villagers, almost as if he was trying to cast an Area of Effect Notice-Me-Not only through mental manipulation.

It was something he had never tried before, and so he resorted to cheating: a blacksmith heard a hammer fall from the workbench and turned in order to look for it, a red-haired young woman was distracted by a suddenly interesting cloud, which seemed to hide some portentous indication about her future with a certain man, a couple of old men busy reminiscing about their youth suddenly remembered that they had hated each other for the attentions of a beautiful maiden, and so started wildly gesticulating to each other and raising their voices, attracting the attention of several other villagers, who suddenly believed that it was something hilarious that they couldn't miss.

Clad in his leather coat, which hid the long multipurpose dagger strapped to the small of his back, David walked without being noticed across the town, remembering to a bunch of children running and playing along the 'street', the there was a warm smell of freshly baked bread in the air, and so they just had to run in a completely different direction from the one that would have brought them to cross paths with the recently christened Rider.

Following the clues he got from sticking his mind among the memories of the civilians, he walked at a brisk pace towards Brom's house, where, engrossed in his thoughts about possible names for his hatchling, he stopped at the doorstep and raised his hand to knock.

A voice rasped: "What do you want, boy?"

David turned on himself smirking, it was hard not to notice the only mind hidden from his own. Behind him, Brom leaned on a twisted staff embellished with strange carvings. He wore a brown hooded robe like a friar, with a pouch that hung from the scuffed leather belt clasped around his waist. Above his white beard, a proud eagle nose hooked over his mouth and dominated his face. He peered at the one-eyed man with deep-set eyes shadowed by a gnarled brow and waited for his reply.

"To meet you." David answered, trailing his fingers over his brow, and recognizing Brom' eyes widening once he put together what happened: "You'll believe Arya more than me, in any case, so I'll let her give you the recounting of recent events." he drawled as he bit into a peach that he extracted from one of his unnaturally deep pockets.

Brom's frown deepened: "How do you know you aren't here on the King's orders?"

David rolled his own eye: "As I said, you'll believe her more than me." without waiting, he simply pushed the door, which swung loudly over the rusty hinges, and entered: there was a lit stone fireplace, stacks of books surrounded a highbacked, deeply carved wooden chair that faced the mantel; the four legs were shaped like eagle claws, and the seat and back were padded with leather embossed with a swirling rose pattern. A cluster of lesser chairs held piles of scrolls. Ink pots and pens were scattered across a writing desk.

For being the main room of a man hidden in the most backwater angle of the land, it looked cozy.

"Oh, don't bother asking for permission." snarked the older Rider behind him, "Make yourself at home."

Without wasting any more time, the one-eyed man lifted his own necklace from his neck, depositing it on the ground only to freeze when he felt a blade rest against his neck when the Iron Trunk returned to its original form.

Luckily enough, he managed to open it before Brom could start torturing him for information: "Arya? Would you mind helping with Brom? I fear that he's grown paranoid..."

As a voice Brom immediately recognized trilled in the Ancient Language from inside the trunk, the old Rider didn't miss the "... damn youngsters these days and their knives..." that the one-eyed man was muttering.

The old Rider took a step back from David as he witnessed a familiar elf walk out from a trunk that wasn't there a minute before.

The one-eyed man sidestepped the female as she started to greet the older Rider in her tongue, honouring him by being the first to salute: "Brom-elda, atra esterní ono thelduin."

David was briefly surprised at hearing her speak first, before remembering that Brom had basically built from the ground up the whole rebellion that had managed to survive on its own wile he hid.

"Atra du evarínya ono varda." the answer came half-stammered, and David couldn't fault the man for being surprised.

"Un atra mor'ranr lífa unin hjarta onr." replied Arya, completing the ritual.

David stopped listening to the quick, musical words that the two exchanged at the entrance of his trunk, he could imagine what the two were saying. At least he hoped he didn't have to dance around the topic of his origins like he did with Arya, nor need to be as circumspect regarding things that he knew only thanks to his metaknowledge.

A joyful mess of warbled colours flowed into his mind through his bond with the hatchling, that had quickly made its way towards him, eager for his attention and some of the stories that he had been narrating in order to figure out a proper name.

With the blue scaled dragon, Raven made herself known with a squawk, landing on his shoulder and sharply pecking him just over his temper: "Gah!" David brought his hand to soothe the ache his familiar had caused, "I've been busy, Raven, you'll soon be able to annoy a lot of people, I'm sure."

At the second peck, even if it was softer, David relented and trailed his fingers over the breast feathers of the bird: "And as soon as the hatchling learns how to talk, I'm sure she'll be delighted to learn riddles from you."

By then, the dragon had started climbing over his frame, with her sharp, white claws ignoring the relative protection that his clothes should have provided. With a huff, David brought the hatchling close to his chest, where she nuzzled him a bit, expressing her distaste about being forced apart from him with another garbled mess of emotions, colours, impressions and smells from their shared bond, accompanied with a thick, black ball of smoke that left her nostrils.

Coughing lightly to disperse the smoke, David let hs mind wash over the dragon, recounting through fast-paced images and emotions the more recent happenings and his expectations about the future: "The sooner you'll learn how to talk in this tongue," he said switching to English, "the sooner we'll get started with the tongue of humans."

Another ball of dark smoke left her nostrils, forcing Raven to flap her wings in order to disperse it: "Smoking lizard!" she crooned hauntingly to the reptile, who, quick as lighting, shot her head towards the bird and snapped her jaw, narrowingly missing the white-feathered familiar as she flew away.

David soon reached the firepit where Fleur was moving, casting his mind forward and assisting to the confusing occlumency that kept him away, only to take a metaphorical step back when a wave of curiosity and pointed-look/you-have-some-explaining-to-do/did-you-succeed succession of requests flashed in his consciousness as an answer.

The hatchling snapped her jaws towards the fire, briefly feeling the confusing effects of being overwhelmed by Fleur' feelings echoing across her connection with David.

We're on the right track, I'll be able to learn magic now... he crouched on the edge on the fire, looking in its depths.

What aren't you telling me? Fleur' words, which weren't projected outside her mind, given her lack of the local mind-reading talents, came with a surrounding bouquet of garbled images and feelings, which made David distinctly uncomfortable as if he wasn't supposed to know them. Her sheer hope, intertwined with suspicion and readiness-for-loss, more than anything else, gave him pause.

Apparently... I've developed a symbiotic bond of sorts with a newborn dragon. He replied sending images of the hatchling and the feelings that he felt about it surrounding the blue scales and far too sharp sapphire eyes.

Fleur didn't immediately answer, even if David was able to pick up the quick churning of her thoughts and reactions, which were matched in the nervous way the white flames moved with while in the firepit.

Does this upset you? he asked.

There are things you're hiding from me, you said you knew in which world we are, as if you had an idea... but you didn't knowingly drag us here, what am I missing?

I don't want to scare you. Was his half-truthful answer, while his fingers scratched the underbelly of the hatching, which for now reminded him more of a cat than of a dragon.

An almost virulent haze of disappointment and distaste rolled within the confines of Fleur's mind. I'm at your mercy am I not? and her bitterness at the idea was almost overwhelming, I can't pry that knowledge from you, I have no eyes to see, no ears to listen, no legs to move, no magic to wield. You owe me the truth, nothing less will satisfy me.

With a deep sigh, David released the hatching, which had grown curious regarding the human that was climbing downstairs. The recently-christened Rider could feel the impenetrable consciousness that was tinged with surprise in witnessing what Arya' words had undoubtedly failed to describe.

Do you remember the multiverse theory? We can scratch the 'theory' part. With his words, a collection of images he had mostly forgotten spilt forth, a series of books for children that narrated events that he had later witnessed in person, and the image of a cover of a blue dragon, paired with a memory of a magnificent egg hatch for him.

We're in... Fleur quickly started to shift across the knowledge he had shared, immediately latching on the parts that were about her life.

It's never been real for you. she accused, ignoring the half-hearted attempts from David to soothe her, showing what little of him survived his continuous experience in the World-Soul, which despite his precautions and theories, had been consuming his humanity, leaving him only as a pawn of his own hollow desire for a knowledge he never needed.

You always lied to me!

The white flames roared out from the firepit, lashing out at him faster than he could dodge them, and searing through the left arm he raised to defend himself, so hot that for a moment David' nerves reported a feeling of coldness while his skin sizzled and burned, as the one-eyed man fell backwards, paying a small price for a life spent never truly considering anyone but himself 'real'.

He hissed through his teeth as the pain made itself known with a persistent throbbing, and he was almost able to see a humanoid shape in the column of white fire that was towering above him, while a few meters away, the hatchling snarled when the pain echoed through the bond she shared with her Rider, turning back to face the sudden enemy.

You will return me to a proper body. Fleur's mind surrounded David's with her presence, expressing her emotions in a whirlwind that left no escape.

You will keep me abreast of the situation. the veela-turned-flame seared her request across the warm air of the magic forest.

And then... then you'll leave me alone.

As if the column of fire was never there, Fleur receded to her quiescent existence, having exhausted all of her strength to maintain their conversation up to that point.

David was left holding his badly burnt arm close to his chest, while his free hand snatched across the crass and clamped on his dragon companion, while his mind expressed a combination of guilt-acceptance-tiredness to stop the hatchling from trying whatever against Fleur. His blue scaled companion was likely resistant to the fire, but the one-eyed man had no idea of what attacking the white flames would cause.

Confusion and denial briefly emanated by the hatchling, only to be buried under concern as she sneaked through the grass closer to him, inspecting his wound with attentive, sapphire eyes that missed nothing.

"What in the name of... what was that?" Brom's voice echoed across the silent clearing, bringing David's lone eye towards him: the crotchety old man that had more or less welcome before was gone, leaving in his place an old warrior with a dangerous glint in his eyes and an ancient-looking sword pointed towards the firepit, while Arya was on his left, quiet as a whisper, with her thin blade unsheathed and words of power already on her lips.

"It was nothing you need to concern yourselves with." David exhaled slowly, "I kind of deserved it." he added, causing the hatchling to scoff some black smoke to express her disagreement with his words

As Brom' eyes found the dragon, widening in marvel, Arya walked forward, extending a hand now that David had confirmed the absence of a threat: "I will heal you." she offered.

"It will heal." David gritted out, recurring to an unorthodox application of Occlumency in order to shunt his feeling of pain to tolerable levels.

"What's her name?" Brom whispered, openly ignoring everything else that had been happening in order to fill his eyes with something that he couldn't believe was real.

The one-eyed man rose to his feet "We've hit a bit of a snag about it, she doesn't seem to enjoy or even tolerate most of the ones I have found."

The hatchling looked curiously toward the old stranger, tilting her head this and that way before glancing questioningly towards David, who reassured her: "He's deeply honoured to meet you." he softly spoke, mentally expressing his certainty that the old man meant her no harm.

"So, did you finish catching up?" David asked in order to change topic, while his dragon scurried across the grass in order to be picked up, after which she quickly climbed over his shoulder, looking down on the other two two-legs present.

"We did." the grouchy Brom answered, not bothering hiding his wonder at seeing both the dragon and the contents of the trunk.

"So we're leaving?" David asked.

Arya nodded: "As soon as we've caught our breaths and Brom finishes packing."

"We can leave with the dawn, you can rest in my..." the old man stopped realizing the implications of having David's Trunk among his bag of tricks.

"I need to disinfect the wound and place on it a paste to make it heal, have Arya bring your stuff down, she's strong enough."

The older Rider scratched his beard thoughtfully: "What can't we replace from my belongings?"

"It doesn't matter, we're taking everything with us." David commented, "I fear that the residing quarters a below are suited only for two, and that my library is quite full, so if the two of you can magic-up a hut for Brom, he can stash his belongings on this floor, it will be raining soon."

"Floor? Raining? But.." Brom looked around, once more at loss for words.

"How do you think I have managed to keep this orchard going on?" the one-eyed Rider commented as he turned towards the staircase: "Water flows in the river, it evaporates and condenses at thirty meters of height, when it reaches a critical mass, it pours over my garden. I'll need to add some water to the reserve in a century or so, but it's a really efficient mechanism."

Brom, his jaw hanging a bit, turned to look at Arya, as in search of answers.

The usually serious elf' lips twitched upwards: "It's easier to understand than when he explained that we're on the side of a napkin." she shrugged.

The one-eyed man snorted at the confusing summary of his own confusing explanation of the enchantment over his Iron Trunk while he scratched the hatchling with his fingers, following her reactions in order to hit exactly the spot she preferred, radiating peace and serenity as he walked. Scales bumped under his fingers as he patted it gently.

Without a warning, a single word rang in his head, deep and clear:

David.

It was solemn and sad, as if an unbreakable pact were being sealed. He stared at the dragon and a cold tingle ran across his skull, radiating from the strange oval mark that the hatchling had given him

David.

A hard knot formed in his stomach as unfathomable sapphire eyes gazed back at him. For the first time, he did not think of the hatchling as something that had happened to him, something that he was forced to accept, something that unavoidably was going to toss him in the eye of the storm that Alagaësia was facing. It was something else, something . . . deeper. There was an acknowledgement in the hatchling's mind, a dignity, an awareness that went beyond what he expected or could easily explain.

David.

The dragon repeated the name again, eyeing him without leaving him any room for deflection, only a stark and clear expectation that was buried across a succession of blurred images that were a brief collection of the moments shared together, with the sensation that those images were to be extended across time, gaining depth and meaning with every successive interaction.

With a sigh, he surrendered to the course of events: "Brom, you know any dragon names? She's been picky about the ones I offered."

Brom shrugged, hiding his smirk when the hatchling snapped his teeth towards her Rider, as to remind him that she was above such a lowly terms, and quickly listed a stream of names. "There was Jura, Hírador, and Fundor, who fought the giant sea snake. Galzra, Briam, Ohen the Strong, Gretiem, Beroan, Roslarb . . ." He added many others. At the very end, he uttered so softly that David almost did not hear, ". . . and Saphira."

Without bothering beating around the bush, he turned towards the hatchling, and asked in the common tongue: "Are you Saphira?"

She looked at him with intelligent eyes. Deep in his mind, he felt her satisfaction.

Yes. Something clicked in his head and her voice echoed, as if from a great distance. He sighed, echoing the satisfaction she felt, and grinned in response. Saphira started humming.

Saphira. he thought, receiving a thrilling acknowledgement from the hatchling across their shared bond.

What does it mean that she insisted, even unknowingly, for a name she had in canon? David wondered, feeling as if there was something more to it than simple chance. Many names he had opposed had been close to being accepted from the hatchling, especially when their history depicted a female being of extraordinary capabilities made of light and fire.

"Do dragons share names with ancestors or dragons that came long before them?" David asked out loud, expecting an answer from the old Rider.

Brom, never to disappoint, nodded slowly, taking a deep breath: "Unless named as soon as they hatched, more often than not the dragons chose their own names among those proposed." he paused for a second, eyeing the hatchling in the one-eyed man's lap with a glint in his eyes: "I'm guessing that you've experienced it yourself?"

David nodded thoughtfully, trying to reconcile the new information with what he knew of dragons, which admittedly, was very little.

I am Saphira. the hatchling thundered through his mind, making his lone eye snap back to her while she whipped her tail across his back.

I am Saphira. she repeated, her mind shifting freely across his recent memories with a speed and a grace that he wouldn't have expected, dragging out his butchered memories of a movie better forgotten and books he never finished reading, before discarding them with contempt and outrage.

I am Saphira. she seared her name into his mind, expecting to be held in the same consideration he held himself, for she was his Dragon, while he was her Rider.

I am Saphira, she intimated, and I am real.

About the travel:

When Saphira and Eragon fly towards a city at the end of Brisingr, Spahira points out her sense of direction, which is thousands of times better than the one of any human. It's something instinctive, and David as a Fox is more easily attuned to that kind of thing than any human-elf-whatever could ever be.

For the timing and the distances, I kept in mind that from Gil'ead to the Farther Dur, Eragon and Murtagh are said to have crossed 180 leagues in 2 weeks (counting the time spent sleeping, shitting, drinking, and whatnot). In particular, the whole valley that the two cross while being followed by a kull-squad is roughly a third of the distance on the map (speaking in straight lines).

Given that David met the elves in a section of forest North of Yazuac and east from the Anora River, and that elves run faster than a horse, considering the difficult terrain, I've put a shift of Arya-David-Arya-David to reach Eragon's village.

About the explanation of the Trunk:

About what the elves know and don't know regarding science... In Inheritance, when Eragon flies towards Vroengard, he sees the earth's curvature and figures out that 'the sky is empty and the world is round', which it's something that later Arya finds 'fascinating'. So I'm working with the idea that all the knowledge of the elves is more geared towards applications of magic and understanding of living beings instead of simple physics. Knowing the name of light allows Eragon to become invisible, but nobody knows what a photon is.

About his walking undetected in the village:

As for what David is able to do with the unprotected minds of the civilians... Paolini really sandbagged what an open mind can be subjected to. It's nothing invasive, and nothing that the MC can keep up constantly (unless he figures out the name for Attention), but he has, in fact, figured out the names for Mind, Memory and Thought, and while he isn't able of using proper magic yet, I'm trying to showcase that a deep understanding of a name allows for a shitload of indirect applications.

David understands how thoughts, memories and mind work, and having free access to all of those allows for a great number of original manipulations.

The reaction of and towards Fleur:

I never understood while the SI that reveal themselves to the other characters are simply accepted without the smallest measure of freak out. If someone told me I was only ink on paper I would go batshit crazy (in the characters' shoes, obviously).

The closest thing to Fleur that either Arya or Brom are familiar with are spirits, which clearly makes them concerned.

Saphira's talking:

The conversations with Saphira will become faster and more important now that she starts actually speaking. In canon, she learned only by hearing Eragon talking to her, since he basically ignored his mental connection for the first few months, in this fic, she'll mentally grow far quicker.

About her name:

There are ancestral memories in lore, they're a small part of what builds up to be the dragons' pool of instincts, so I elaborated an explanation that new names are given to less than willful dragons as soon as they're born, before they can quite figure out what the fuck is going on. Or at least with dragons that grow up to be less imposing than Saphire, which is quite more headstrong than Either Firnen or Thorn.

Every time I wrote hatchling, dragon, or scaly companion, I found myself having to go back and erase the Saphira name that I wrote unknowingly, because in my head the name always remained the same.

In a completely unrelated matter, I thank Mr Beaver Buttington for his patronage.

I've finally set up my own site, where my fics can be downloaded in pdf (complete, not chapter by chapter), and you can support me through a donation if you have the means and the wish to do so.

cloud9stories dot net is the name of my site, you can find the complete caption on my profile if googling it isn't enough (for whatever reason ff doesn't let me copy-past the URL here).

Thank you!