Author's Note:
Thank you for everyone reading! There was a question over when new chapters will be published. There will be one every week on Sunday (USA Mountain Time, sorry NZ residents) and any extra chapters I write before then will be published as soon as they are written. Once again, any comments, questions, or observations are welcomed and appreciated! Since the chapter I published on Friday came out early and I spent a ton (like a ton) of time on it, I decided to keep my deadline but write a much shorter chapter, this time from Elva's point of view, including a flashback to start explaining the (not small) part she played in this great saga.
Italic is a character thinking to themselves, or talking to another mentally.
Regular text is regular text
Bold is an author's note
Chapter 3 - Elva
After Eragon had finished his tale, Elva sat still at the table, looking at the beautiful purple wings of Vórya behind her. She sensed his mind beginning to wander, probe about the area for anything amiss. Trying not to make any outward motion, she cast a quick enchantment to allow her mind to pass unseen, then surrounded Vórya's sleeping consciousness with her own, hiding it. Too late. Elva moved, slipping unconsciously between the form of a human and that of a shadow. Not fast enough. Eragon opened his mouth to shout a spell just as Elva slid under the table and stood in front of him, moving to clap her hand over his mouth.
"Risa!" His lips moved the same instant Elva took a step toward him. She drew back, her eyes widened, her eyebrows furrowing in a look of pain and sorrow. Behind her, Vórya had roared into action, the juggernaut of a dragon thrashing about, tearing down pillars. Heat suffused from the columns of flame pouring from her maw. Eragon's cold blue gaze met her blazing purple for a split instant before Elva drew her cloak around her thin frame and, spinning, disappeared into nothing.
Gánga! Elva screamed in her mind at the crazed dragon. It did not respond, but it seemed to understand. It whirled, spinning about the great hall, crushing all in sight. Elva did not look back as she jumped onto the great dragon's back, hanging onto an amethyst spine . Please, don't die. Eragon. Arya. Angela. She shielded her face with one hand as an enormous explosion ripped her home apart. In the middle of the crater formed by the blast she saw the outlines of several blurry shapes along with the other two dragons. Despite the ever-increasing distance, she locked eyes with Arya, who tilted her head, then put three fingers to her lips and knelt, bowing her head. Elva's breath caught in her throat and tears filled her eyes. She turned away, eyes burning, hugging onto the purple dragon's back as she flew on, silent, towards the descending sun.
Elva stepped out of the cloud of smoke, the only indication she had appeared where she had not been before, into a thick jungle. Crows covered the trees, deafening her with their incessant noise. Her eyes flashed, a wispy purple smoke streaming from her eyes and dissipating above her gilded head. She screamed, a primal sound, driven by pure emotion. The birds evacuated their perches at once, desperate to escape from the mad, grief-stricken creature among them. Elva fell to her knees, her torn dress billowing behind her. Water dripped from the evergreens, a steady drip that did nothing to calm her nerves. She reached up, pulling the simple silver and amethyst diadem she had worn from her hair with an angry tug. She threw it aside, her latent magic pulsing through her arm, making it snap straight in a blur. The diadem shattered against a moss-covered rock. Elva fell back on her heels, staring up to the sky in an expression of utter hopelessness. And now the tears fell, hot and thick, on the bed of pine needles. She remained so, mourning what had been, for several minutes, before brushing away the wetness on her cheeks with the dirty sleeve of her dress. The contrast of the dirt against her almost-translucent skin gave her a look of one drowning in an unfamiliar land. She stood, her already torn dress shredding itself against a rock. She slowly pulled her unruly hair over one shoulder and reached behind her back, unlacing the dress, then allowing it to drop on the ground. She stepped out of the pile of fabric, walking deeper into the trees, propelled by some unknown intuition. She walked for several minutes, her face down-turned, contemplating the patterns the needles made on the rocks with an extraordinary emptiness of mind. The forest seemed to continue in a similar fashion forever, tall pine trees and scattered rocks filling the landscape. A single rock pile several hundred feet ahead of Elva was the only unique feature, and she angled that direction in hopes of finding something, anything. As she walked closer, her anguish increased at her lack of discovery. A scowl came over her face and purple streams of smoke began once again to trickle from her eyes, giving her the look of an unearthly wolf demon stalking through the trees. The air around her hands shimmered, streaked through with a violet and black energy. The crackling spread through the air, wrapping itself around her bare body until she appeared to be sheathed in indistinct sparks. She continued towards the rock pile, her mind almost completely gone, staggering forward on instinct alone. She weaved her way between and over the rocks, her touch shattering them, sending deadly spikes of rock hurtling through the air. As she drew closer to the peak, storm clouds began to gather above, a spinning maelstrom of lightning and driving rain. Elva cleared the final few feet, then collapsed with a crunch on the stone slab that crowned the small hill of fallen rocks. The halo of energy around her grew in size, illuminating the darkening field. Raindrops splashed on the stones, Elva's electric aura jumping between them. She breathed in heavily, then screamed once more. A more terrible sound had never been heard. Her wail seemed to cut the fabric of the world, sending spirits and beasts pouring through. Elva clutched her head, throbbing in pain, and curled up on the stone slab. A single tear slid down her cheek, and time seemed to pause. The instant the tiny drop touched the surface of the rocky disk, a surge of power leapt from Elva's back into the sky, a bolt arcing out of the storm clouds to meet it halfway. A crack sounded as the cascade of electricity struck the ground, blinding Elva and cracking the stone. A shower of pebbles pinged off the larger boulders, the sound multiplied a thousandfold, and Elva continued holding her head until the noise had subsided. The aura of power around her was gone, stripped away by nature's wrath meeting her own. She shivered, then blinked and sat. The power of the bolt striking so close to her had thrown her back several feet, away from the peak of the rock pile. Breathing heavily from the gargantuan amount of energy she had expended, she pulled her weary, emaciated frame into a standing position against the boulder that blocked her view. Pausing for a moment, she surveyed herself for major injuries. A small line of blood leaked from her exposed hip, and a bruise was forming on her breast where she had bounced against a rock, but she was otherwise unharmed. Leaning heavily on the rock, she limped into view of the cracked circle of rock and gasped audibly. In the exact spot the bolt had struck sat an egg, royal purple and veined with black and white. She knelt beside the dragon egg carefully, then reached with one finger to touch its smooth warm surface. As she grazed it, the Gëdwey Ignasia on her forehead burned, and she could feel it changing. Elva laid down, wrapping herself around the egg. She breathed in, then out, and the world was no more.
A smile came to Elva's face as she remembered. Rivend had torn apart Algaësia, and she was being hunted by the magicians on account of their friendship. The magicians were not the real problem. She could have destroyed them all a thousand times over, but she could not travel safely among the people of Algaësia for fear of recognition, and she refused to take lives unless it was absolutely necessary. If not for the arrival of Vórya, she would have gone mad, taken by her feeling of hopelessness. She patted the dragon, who snorted in response. A series of images flashed through Elva's head, Vórya as a hatchling, flying for the first time, Elva's bloodied thighs, Elva's confusion when she realized Vórya could understand speech but could not speak herself. Elva grinned, shaking her head. Those days are long gone. You are much too big for me to wrap my legs all the way around you! The dragon replied with an image of a sapling growing next to a massive oak tree. Exactly. We should land soon. The nïdwhalar will protect us while we rest. The sound of folding wings told Elva that the dragon was in agreement, and several seconds later Vórya's gilded paws hit the water, slowing her considerable momentum until she had settled to shoulder depth. A huge, sail-like fin broke the surface twenty meters away, and Elva nodded. Thank you, ebrithilar. As Vórya snapped up her fill of small fish, Elva strung her hammock as Eragon always did, between two of the larger spikes on her dragon's back. Good night, partner of my heart and mind. Vórya hummed, relaxing, and was asleep soon after Elva.