Hello everyone,
Back again with the latest chapter. Enjoy! As always don't miss the authors note at the bottom.
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
EDIT: SORRY ABOUT THE CONFUSION, I ACCIDENTALLY UPLOADED 18 AGAIN. THANKS TO THE REVIEWERS FOR LETTING ME KNOW!
Aberon was much bigger than Teirm. It sat on a large bluff and plains, turned farmland, surrounded the city. The wall wasn't very impressive, Orrin's castle, however, was. There were more walls surrounding it, and four towers jutted into the sky.
I had yet to enter the city since we have been setting up the camps on the outskirts of the city.
Until now of course. I thought as I saw Nasuada riding towards where I sat on my own trusty steed.
Go play politics. Shadowcat told me as she jumped off the horse from my lap and scampered off to torture some poor soul somewhwere.
"Stronghammer." I heard as Nasuada pulled up next to me.
"Nasuada." I returned with a nod of my head. Things had been tense between us since my denial to her proposal.
"Kind Orrin has requested our presence." She told me bluntly.
I've always liked how blunt she is. I thought to myself.
"After you, my lady." I told her teasingly.
A glare was all I got before she turned away and led the way into the city.
Soon we met up with the rest of our entourage, Jormundur and the rest of the council rode beside me, behind Nasuada. We agreed to make a good impression of the Varden so we had all of our Centurion's marching in front and behind us as we made our way into the city.
The gates were much more impressive up close than from far away, now that we could see the murals decorating it. The gates opened and we made our way through the city, following our escort to the castle.
People lined the streets to watch the leaders of the army camped outside their walls go to meet their King. The first level of the city were the lowest income earners, it wasn't quite the slums but I could tell that the conditions could be better.
Soon we passed into the second level of the city, and I could immediately tell the difference between the people. The streets were well kept, the clothes on the people back were of better quality. The guards lining the streets were in greater quality here also.
To make sure the 'peasants' don't cause trouble for these higher class of individuals. I couldn't help but think to myself.
The third level of the city was the busiest, and subsequently the largest. It was obvious that this is where all of the markets and businesses were located. People of all demographics lined the streets here, rich, poor, it didn't matter at the market. I assumed it was because of the very large number of guards that stood on every corner and walked up and down, patrolling the streets.
The fourth level had another wall we had to pass through, a cluster of guards stood in front of every entrance here. I could feel their eyes on Fram,my warhammer, and the dagger sheathed on my lower back.
Competent, at least. I thought noticing their stares and matching it with one of my own.
We moved past the gate and immediately I knew this was the nobles share of the city, the houses were much nicer and had much more space in between them. There were actually some rudimentary landscaping done also, which was actually impressive. It took us less time to travel through this level of the city than any other.
Most of the wealth in the country located in a quarter of a mile. My mind supplied.
We met another wall fairly quick and passed another gate and another group of guards to enter into the castle proper. The seat of power in Surda.
Apparently we wouldn't have to travel any further because King Orrin stood waiting for us in the middle of the courtyard, surrounded by what I assumed is his family. They were flanked by even more guards than I thought necessary.
I wouldn't take any chances with my family either, if I were him.
"Nasuada, old friend, it is good to see you." Orrin started the conversation off. No title, trying to act friendly.
"King Orrin. Thank you for your hospitality." Nasuada responded respectfully. Title, overly formal, respect the man in his own castle I suppose. Formalities must be observed.
"Oh please drop the titles, we are all friends here." He answered her. "Come everyone let's head inside and sup together."
And so ensued the most boring night of either of my lives.
I spent most of the night in Orrin's court warding off widows of prominent nobles, daughters of prominent nobles, and even the wives of prominent nobles.
Nearly everyone that approached me would whisper in my ear 'I would love to experience why they call you the 'stronghammer'', or some variant of it. Everytime I had to remind myself that I couldn't embarrass myself, the Varden, or Nasuada. And that ruining another mans wife or daughter for other men is a line that I shouldn't cross, unless in rare circumstances. This was not one of those rare circumstances.
The rest of the time I listened to old generals prance around in their garb and tell stories of the good old days and how this generation had grown soft and fat. I didn't feel the need to remind them that the last time a major war happened, it was a hundred years ago and their great great great grandfathers were still sucking on a teet when Galby took control.
Eventually Nasuada found me again and led me into a private meeting with Orrin himself, an honor I did not expect nor want.
"He will make his move early." She whispered into my ear as we entered into his solar.
"Ah this is the man they call Stronghammer." Orrin started as I walked in.
"King Orrin, the city is beautiful, as is your country." I had been practicing that line for a while. I am not good at this shit. I thought to myself as the words left my lips.
"Well thank you, I take pride in how much it has improved, you should have seen it under my fathers rule. Unfortunately, he liked to spend his life in between a whores legs, but well, we all have our vices I suppose." He replied spilling a little too much detail about his father. Must be common knowledge.
"Now, I'll make the business quick. My steward just got word to me that the appraisal of the silk is done and you have held up your end of the bargain. He also gave me an update on the blacksmiths, and we should be done by tomorrow." Orrin continued without either of us commenting.
"That's great news, our men thank you, as do we." Nasuada told him looking genuinely happy.
"Good, good, Nasuada, would you mind if I spoke to Roran alone? You know men love to be blunt with each other." Orrin asked her while also implying a few things about women.
Luckily, Nasuada ignored him. She obviously expected this because she didn't even hesitate when she nodded. "Be careful with him, he is valuable to me."
Once she was gone, he turned to me. "Ah, I can see I have already lost this battle. Well good luck with that, she is a wildfire that one."
He thinks we are together. I thought as I unpacked his sentence, I didn't see any reason to correct him.
"She is a good leader, better than I ever will be." I said in response, playing dumb intentionally.
"Mmmm I am not so sure about that. The Varden sings songs about Stronghammer every night around the campfires, or so I'm told. Nasuada has not a bad word to say about you, at least not in my company." He paused then, taking a sip of his wine or brandy or whatever it was.
"Has she proposed yet?" Orrin asked. "What am I thinking, of course she has. Was it right after the battle? Ah no matter, no doubt you accepted."
Once again, I saw no need to correct him. The less he knows, the better, I say.
"You don't say much do you?" He asked after I stayed silent.
"Only when I have something to say." I responded simply.
"What will you say when the people demand you take control of the Varden. Once she, inevitably, makes a costly mistake?" He asked me.
"I think I would say no." I answered quickly to that one.
"Oh if only it were that simple." He said laughing.
Why has everyone been saying that?
The week passed by extremely quickly, my time was spent teaching Du Gata Vrangr lessons in the ancient language. Most of the theoretical aspects we had already covered, at least all of the ones I felt comfortable covering, we covered.
We would practice speaking in the ancient language in the mornings. The afternoons were spent attacking and defending each other minds.
Carn continued to outsrip the rest of his peers, whether it was a natural propensity towards the subjects or his motivation to reach fluency I couldn't pin down. All I knew was that he took to magic like a fish to water.
"He's ready." Vanir would say to me in private. "His skill in the sword has already passed yours and he understands what we're saying when it's just us."
"I know." Was all I would respond to him, unable to pull the trigger and grant him the changes he wanted.
Casting the spell on yourself was one thing, but endangering someone else was another. Any slip of the mind and I could damage him permanently, and I didn't have Oromis or Brom to help me this time.
You don't need help, just like you didn't need them last time. Shadowcat would tell me when I asked her opinion on the subject.
He's as ready as I ever was, if not as mature. I thought to myself as I stood inside my tent prepared to go to bed now that the day was over.
The soldiers were all equipped and drilling daily, like mad men. The new tactics boosted the morale, everyone knew that if they could fight the Battle of Farthen Dur again, we wouldn't have lost so many people. It inspired confidence, and a motivation to not lose any more brothers in arms.
These are the thoughts that haunt my mind every night as I lay down for bed. Not the faces of the urgals I killed, not the thoughts of my impending doom or the likelihood of being killed in the coming war.
The lives of all the people that will go to war, it's the living, their faces that haunt my dreams. Especially the kid in Du Gata Vrangr. He has no idea what is coming.
"Stronghammer." I heard from the front of my tent.
"Aye?" I asked as I stood up to throw on my pants and shirt.
"Nasuada requests your presence in her tent. I am to take you there." One of her personal guards said.
I sheathed my dagger on my back and opened the flap to my tent. I stayed very close to her tent anyways, because of my status and her wanting the magicians close to her should shit go down.
Soon enough I was brought before her and she was not alone. Orrin was there also, his retinue of guards outside her tent told me before I even walked in.
"What happened?" I asked as I strode into the tent.
"We got word tonight. The imperial army marches, one hundred thousand men are headed our way." Nasuada answered.
Orrin was busy with his head in his hands, obviously not excited about what was to come.
"Have you made any decisions yet?" I asked curious.
"We think the best way is to meet them, here." She said pointing to a map, her finger landed on a patch of land just to the north of Surda. "The Burning Plains."
And so it begins. I thought to myself.
"Good, we can't let them march all the way to the capitol. When do we move out?" I asked.
"Three days. Have you made any contact with Eragon?" She asked hopefully.
"No, he is within Ellesmera's wards, it is impossible to contact him unless we are within those wards." I told her.
"So we go without our rider." She half asked half said to the air.
"He is set to return soon. I don't think Brom will miss us mobilizing, he has been watching us no doubt." I told her. I was leaving out some information of course, Brom knows the time table that they had and I told him to be scrying the army for when the time comes, no doubt Arya was already on her way.
I missed the Agaeti Blodhren. I thought to myself. That's something I always wanted to be there for.
"There is still hope then?" Nasuada asked me and Orrin's head whipped up in relief.
I smiled at them. "There is always hope." I said trying to be wise, probably failing.
"We will be ready, the soldiers are the best trained in the world. We will be going up against children no doubt, farmers, not soldiers. We have the superior force." I told them honestly, not sure how they forgot such information.
"You're right, they outnumber us so much." Orrin replied.
"Have you sent word to Hrothgar?" I asked Nasuada.
"Our fastest rider left right before you arrived." She responded.
I can run faster than our fastest rider. I thought to myself but didn't volunteer for the job.
"Good, the elves will mobilize soon also. Galbatorix will be fighting a war on two fronts, this might be the most important battle to win, so we will win it." I told them honestly.
"Your optimism is contagious, and for that I am grateful. It's exactly what we need." Orrin cut in. "We will be ready, I have work to do, if you'll excuse me." He said as he nodded to us and walked out, leaving us alone.
I have been alone with her more than any other person I think.
"Do you really think we'll win." She asked as she poured us both a glass of wine, we needed it.
"Yes, we have to." I told her, obviously knowing we will win. I took the glass from her and whispered a spell to make sure it wasn't poisoned. More for her benefit than mine, my body could probably fight off most poisons at this point.
I downed the whole glass in one go.
"Impressive." She smiled, noticing my actions.
"I need it, although it won't do anything for me." My metabolism is just too good.
"Oh yes, I forgot." She said sitting down next to me on the comfortable couch I always claimed during our meetings.
"Are you scared?" She asked me with a rare vulnerability in her voice.
"Terrified." I answered looking at her.
"Me too."
We didn't say anything for a while, I thought she was going to fall asleep for a moment because her head met my shoulder and rested there.
Our peaceful situation didn't last long.
"Ma'am she is bus…"
"I don't care, get out of my way before I use your armor to suffocate you."
I knew that voice. Angela.
"Let her in." I said, raising my voice and startling the body resting on mine. Maybe she did fall asleep.
In walked the famous witch and attached to her hip was a little girl with a silver star on her brow.
Elva.
Her eyes locked on to mine and I knew she was experiencing my anxiety and my pain. My mind ran through the verbage Eragon used for her and came up with possibilities to stop her gift from working on me. It took me a few moments but I decided that I wouldn't be able to use words for this particular magic.
My mind dipped into my necklace and immediately I grabbed a hold of the power and used my will to shape my wards to allow what I wanted it to do. Because no words were used, the magic was done quickly but the effects were known immediately.
I felt the magic keep flowing and flowing to enact my will and I could tell it was working. Eventually the magic stopped and I felt the normally cold steel on my neck warm. I reached back into the pool of magic and noticed it didn't even dent the massive amount of power I had but it had taken about a dragons worth of energy.
It makes sense, Saphira did work some wild magic, right? I thought to myself.
Elva noticed the change before anyone else. "Thank you. Yours is hard to understand." Her voice was chilling. A grown woman's voice coming out of a child's body shouldn't happen.
She's talking about my pain.
Angela had long since accepted my proficiency with magic but even she looked impressed once she figured it out.
"Of course, no one should have to experience all of this." I told her as I motioned for her to come here.
She looked up at Angela before she ran over to me. I swept her up in a hug, I love children after all. NOT LIKE THAT!
She didn't giggle like a normal child but she was smiling when I put her on my hip.
"I take it, this is the child my cousin tried to bless?" I asked Angela.
"Yes, you knew about her already?" She asked me in return.
"Arya told me, but she didn't know the wording. I had to get it from Eragon." I lied to her.
"So you know the wording?" She asked me.
"Yes, but it is reinforced with dragon magic. I'm pretty sure he needs to be the one who undoes it." I told her honestly not thinking that I could undo the work.
"That's what I was afraid of." Angela said, I could taste her anger in the air.
"What is going on!?" Nasuada finally asked from her seat beside me.
"Oh sorry." I said genuinely forgetting that we hadn't described why Angela burst into her tent with Elva.
"Elva here, was blessed by Eragon a couple months ago when she was a baby." I told her.
"And she's grown to be this size because of the magic." Angela cut in. "And it wasn't a blessing it was a curse. She feels other people's pain and has to interfere to stop it."
"'A shield to misfortune', that is what Eragon messed up." I said completing the puzzle and Nasuada's eyes widened in comprehension.
Elva interrupted us before we could continue.
"Do you have anything to eat?"
A/N: Another chapter down, a little short but it was a more natural stop than anything else coming up.
Elva has been introduced! I am playing with her character a little, making her immature right now, but she will get to her sassy-I hate everyone and the world for this gift/curse-self. Still some fillers until we get to the battle, but it is coming up!
Let's talk in the reviews!