Whoo another chapter in another day. I've set aside an hour a day for writing. I got 4 reviews for the last chapter; which I am very happy about, thanks for all the kind words. This is my favourite chapter so far. It is very short though. Expect some mistakes: I wrote this in less than 40 minutes.

Oh and Restrained Freedom I forgot to mention this but you asked if death had seen Murtagh whilst he was being tortured: death sees everything.

Hope you enjoy!

Not to relive them, just to remind you – Lupe Fiasco, Never Forget You.

"Arya!"

Eragon catapulted skywards, his body drenched with sweat, with the faint essence of fear colouring his posture. The algid waft soon crystallised his pain, hardening it past eternity. He was in his tent, the simple yet elegant leather seemed to imprison his insecurities; exaggerate his boorish and fatuous emotions. He was shaking, drawing halting breaths; he strived to conquer his racing heart, as his life giving blood continued its now sluggish voyage. It was a simpleton's quest: control eluded his dulled reflexes and loss surmounted his being.

"Oh Arya..." it came out a chant, to some forbidden ritual, mirroring his relationship with the princess.

Head in hands, he persisted in his inaudible mutterings, nothing of consequences passing his lips; just the lashing pain and inner animosity. Eragon remembered little, another being forcing him to forget. His mind inhabited by feral thoughts, blending and separating the right from the wrong, from the evil and the righteous. Death was now prevalent within him; it's being feeding off Eragon's soul, copying him, changing what it willed, until a new entity built itself into his life, his thoughts and emotions now divided by a wall of unfathomable heights and power.

And yet all that mattered was the safety of one person, the safety of one elf. Death he could deal with; not hers.

Arya, please be safe... for me.

Eragon could feel the timeless wisdom of the other rising through him, spreading to every to every nail of every finger. He should have been ecstatic. Yet the wisdom came with a price: love and hate replaced by casual disregard for life and death, drowning a lifetime of morals and teachings in razor edged logic; capable of acts of great kindness and even greater atrocities. It consumed him and burned through every recess of the living. Completely inhumane. Eragon lost himself in the ever changing tide; surrendered. And waited. And waited...

Salvation came with the unlikely intrusion of a Sapphire head through the bellicose entrance flaps. Hope suffused itself into Eragon's bloodstream and the grandeur of courage restored, defiant, willing to endure the perpetual scourge. He had a reason to exist; he needed to exist; for those trapped under Galbatorix, for those yet to suffer his black hand, his plague, he could end the suffering and usher in a new age of peace and harmony. He would.

Bracing himself against the torment and loss, Eragon pushed himself to his feet; swaying as he fought the inrush of vertigo. Saphira poured a stream of subdued energy, slowly heating his body and mind, tearing the confusion from the knowledge and beauty of life. Humbled, Eragon stumbled towards his saviour, his feet crushing the stench of defeat beneath his feet. He clung to the dragon's neck, pressed himself against her as to impeach his own clinging doubts, enduring till each vanished, with the beat of his traitorous heart. With the acceptance came the tears, wet, hot and hated. But a creep at first, developing into a furious flow, washing the misery down with them; only to disappear into the living shadows.

The sharp crackle of lightning illuminated dragon and rider, signalling the return of sound as the torrential downpour battered the vulnerable ground; destroying havens of ice and cold, removing the hard clung frost of days past.

And through it all Eragon shed his modesty and unravelled the chains of his heart and allowed the salty tears of relief and pain cascade down his cheeks, each a diamond cast by the light. He cried for his farm and his uncle, his father and Oromis, his cousins and their child, for his brother's suffering, for his lost life and... for his Arya...

Arya... Arya... Arya...

Her name a mantra accompanying each beat of his heart, as he reminisced on time spent with her, of her smile and heavenly laugh, even her alluring anger. He pushed his face into Saphira's hard, warm scales and took a deep steadying breath.

She blew warm air over his form, bringing his slightly damp hair to life, "Oh little one..." her words soothing and reassuring; speaking as a mother would. Warmth bloomed at her words, a spring of gratefulness welled up at Eragon's heart, only to be replaced with shock as she continued her monologue.

"Arya is perfectly fine."

Eyes wide open; Eragon flung his face to meet her large, glinting eyes. Desperation born; begging her words to be true.

"No... It cannot be... the creature; death itself informed me of her demise."

She keened quietly; her normally captivating eyes ignored as Eragon sought his truth; pleaded with the fates to allow his mistakes and wrongs, hoping with a painful tug for the dragoness's words to be realities trumpets.

She answered, slowly, as to allow no misinterpretation between them, "I know not what to make of this being... but your thoughts clouded, shaded upon Arya's fate," she paused and passed a compassionate embrace across their link, alleviating Eragon of undue suffering, "You are closed from the world, allow your touch to wander and you shall find what you desire."

Her words were heard, yet their implication escaped Eragon as his desperate thoughts arranged themselves; pieced her advice together, with painstaking precision, along the cut of an elven sword.

The coins dropped.

(Time Lapse)

The morning brought with it new life. Winters strangle hold momentarily lifted as nature prospered, aided as it was by the nights unforgiving rain. A fairy tale of happiness met Eragon's wake; a surge of memories overpowered his tapered defences. The pain, the loss and the eventual recovery, as Saphira moulded him back to creation, with her words of comfort and presence of will.

Death still lingered. He knew it always would; but neither did it overcome him; degrade him into a soulless puppet whose strings had been cut short. His emotions and feelings remained his own, guarded as he was from the taint of negligence that spread like a corrosive poison from every pore of death's intrusion. Eragon now possessed a counter balance. True there was no cure for death; yet a failsafe existed: and Eragon kept it close to his heart, nurturing it, exploring its depths and feats; his grip on humanity, on the right paths and on his destiny.

True no antidote existed.

But he had the next best thing.

A barrier. He smiled and stepped into the light, blinded: like the future.

So... How was it? Leave a review, really appreciate them. I am really starting to hate the previous chapters, I was so unsure when I wrote those (having never written a story) but I feel my writing and confidence has come a long way in the newer chapters and the older ones feel inadequate.