Adurna Nightstar Evanshade: Doing what on my own? And I thank you for me being one of your two favorite authors.

SeeKayO.o: Werecat hybrid wolf. I've to decide how I'm going to legitimize that. There's two possible ways. Yeah, but anyways, it's not her either. :)

Glacion God of Ice: Thanks. The thinly veiled Assassin's Creed motto in this chapter is dedicated to you.

Obliterator1519: :) I love milestones.

eragonfan1: Yeah, FanFiction had some sort of crash.

FlexManSteel: :) I do my best, but frankly I don't think I did all that good at that. Thank you for your reassurance.

logically psycho: FanFiction had a crash so it looked like you had reviewed on a bunch of chapters but you didn't write anything. My apologies. I'll do my best to not let that happen in the future. I do really suck at chess. I'm apparently good at forward thinking, but not when I need it.

mmd8280: :) Thank you. I try my hardest and I've had awesome beta readers to help the plot line along (love both of you)

Caironater: The action less phase is both necessary and at the same time boring. A lot of people were emailing me with doubts about Aesire's strategic abilities, given his eye power to make anyone do as he says, so I had to set them straight on that. Oh, I love Minecraft. :)

AdurnaBrisingr: wow, first time someone has ever asked me for advice in an anonymous review. Um...looking back on my other stories I'm surprised it got the publicity it did, because it was not that awesome. I'm just extremely grateful that many of my readers were willing to give me another chance. I've also been blessed by many new readers.
In my opinion the key isn't having a lot of stories. My brother, who was the inspiration for Aesire, told me that it's better to have one good story than several mediocre ones. Inspiration is a reusable resource. If you were truly meant to be an author inspiration to write shouldn't be something you have to force. It should just come to you naturally. Plus, apparently, my stories have a plot. Looking back at writing the first five I just wrote whatever I wanted to without even the foggiest clue what was going to happen in the next chapter. Now I have a very clear image of what I want the remainder of BloodFire, and books after it, are going to be like. So, to answer your question I don't really do it, others do it for me. There's no better feeling to me than getting a review back saying I did awesome and no worse feeling than getting a review back saying they hated it.

The dark clouds of Eragon's dreams converged on him like a pack of wolves surrounding their pray. In the darkness that so enveloped him he heard a sickening crunch and a woman's scream of pain.

"Allow us to show you something," a man's voice and a dragon's growl intoned. A blinding flash of light erupted before him and the clouds were lifted to reveal the siege of a castle. Men, all of them wearing identical blue and white uniforms, fired arrows and ballista's at a high castle wall. On it was a pendent that bore a red and a blue dragon facing opposite directions and both breathing fire. The blue's fire dipped downward while the red's flared upward. "This is the day," the voices said, once again in unison, "that it all began."

An archer on the battlements fired a bow and the arrow zipped towards Eragon. He raised a hand to defend himself, but the arrow passed through him as if he were no more than the mist that clouded the air. With dizzying speed, Eragon was wrenched from the outside of the castle to the courtyard. He looked up at where the archers fired at the assaulting army and saw a black clad man looking down at him. "This is the day," the voices said, "that our lives changed."

With wings spread outward like a gigantic bat, a green dragon flapped to a stop beside the battlements. A young man, the Rider, leapt from the dragon's back and onto the battlements. The green dragon roared and dipped down into the battle again. The young man looked down into the courtyard with an expression of dismay. "Direct your gaze downward," the voices said.

Eragon looked and beheld a armor clad woman laying on the stones of the courtyard, blood gushing up from a wound in her shoulder, dangerously close to her heart. Lying beside her was a bloody dagger one of the assaulting solders must have thrown at her. The young Rider looked at the black clad figure and said, "Is she alright?"

"Does she look alright?" the man roared back. The both of them jumped the twenty feet to the ground and the black clad man staggered as he hit the ground. They both ran to her and the young Rider raised his hands over her and began to chant deeply. A shimmer came from his left palm and the blood coming from the woman stopped momentarily, but the severity of the injury forced its way past the man's magic and began to drip onto the courtyard once again. "Do something!" The black clad man cried almost incoherently.

"I'm doing everything I can! I haven't been trained to heal something like this!"

"Stop," the woman said, sounding like someone he felt like he should know. "Save your power for when it is needed."

"This is needed," the Rider said, and clenched his eyes closed as he forced out more magic. The weak burst of power, however, was not even strong enough to stop the bleeding. The Rider collapsed onto his knees, beaten.

"What are you doing," the black clad man said, and Eragon saw a drop of liquid fall from his eye. "Do something!"

"I've done everything I can do."

The black clad man gripped the Rider by the collar of his shirt and dragged him up. "No! Do you have any idea how long I've had to listen to you brag about how strong you are? You are not going to just play lame now!"

"Leave him," the woman said, strangely calm. The black clad man looked down at her.

"You...you can't just...die. You were about to become a full Rider."

"Every Rider must prove their bravery before they become a Rider in full. This is mine. I stand on the gates of death and I feel no fear." She looked at the Rider expectantly. He swallowed past a hard lump visible on his throat.

"We are the Riders," he said, in a ceremonial voice, "We live in the dark to serve all that is light. From the noble actions of our forefathers do we draw this mission. Each Rider must prove his dedication to our Order by an act of bravery not meant for the weak hearted. This Rider has been killed in service to her people. No braver act exists. She stands before the threshold of death and feels not the fear of the shadows. Therefore, by the power enthralled into me by the Mighty Dragons, I name her Dragon Rider and bestow onto her all rights that such a title of power entails. May her spirit and that of her dragon intertwine as never before." An expression of peaceful rapture came across the now full Dragon Rider. The black clad man crouched down beside her, the tears flowing down his face.

"You can't leave me," he whispered.

The woman opened her eyes and placed a hand on his cheek. "Is that what you think? I'm leaving you? As long as you live, I will never depart from this land." Her hand fell from his face, losing the strength to keep it upright. With her last dregs of life, she whispered, "I shall always love you." Then she closed her eyes and as the battle of the castle continued to rage, she died. There was a moment of still quiet from the crouching man.

"I'm sorry," the Rider said.

"Move," the man kneeling beside the woman said, so low it was almost inaudible.

"What?"

"Move!" The Rider stepped aside as the black clad man stood and spun around. He went to the staircase that led to the battlements. With each step he took, Eragon could feel something malevolent from the man, some evil enthralling him. Eragon flinched back as he blinked and found himself on the battlements beside the man. The shadows blocking Eragon's view of his eyes had lifted and Eragon shrank from the wrath in them. As the men on the ground saw him, they began firing arrows and throwing swords and knifes desperately at him. Each weapon thrown veered off course almost the instant it left its thrower's hand. The air around Eragon began to tremble under the raw anger coming from the man beside him. The stones on the ground lifted without provocation, floating like bubbles in a pond, lifted by such black magic as Eragon had never felt before. The walls of the castle began to crack. The man said in such a convoluted voice Eragon could hardly understand it, "Die."

Like the stillness before a thunderclap, the word hung in the air. Then as it reached the ear of the attacking men, they fell over and died. Every man, regardless of age, was slain as soon as they heard the word spoken. Even the plants and death birds in the air had the life ripped from them. The shout of the man that followed was a thousand times worse than the Lethrblaka's scream.

Eragon sat up with an incoherent cry. He sat panting for air. The future, the dragon and the man said, as you have chosen it. Eragon placed a hand on his head and took a deep breath. He spun around and put his legs over the edge of the cot and shook his head, drying desperately to dissipate the sound of the man screaming.

"Eragon." Arya's voice cut through his delaying nightmares. He looked back at her. Since the fall of Belatona the day prior, she had moved all her belongings into his tent. The simple joy of her love was enough to throw off fears.

"I'm fine," he said, attempting to reassure her. He did not succeed. She slid her way over to his side.

"How many times now is it that you have woken up in a pant and sweat?"

"Counting the times you were there or no?" She did not react to his attempt at humor. He was silent for a moment then he said, "I don't know."

She scouted closer to him and said, "Tell me."

Eragon sighed and surrendered. "The day before we left for Dras'Leona, I had a nightmare. It was as real as a premonition. But unlike other premonition's I've had, this one seems to be multiple happenings all revolving around one man. I dreamed I was in complete darkness and this man came out of it and called me a fool. I don't remember his every word, but he took me to a place he claimed was Ellesmera. Every tree had been burned to the ground. Saphira and you were there, and you both were dead. Then this horrible black and red dragon roared at me and it was like it was yelling at me. It said something about this being the future if I continued down the path I was on. His Rider called him the Shade of the World. He has been tormenting my dreams ever since."

Arya was silent for a span. "Do you believe these to be premonitions?"

"If you dream the same dream over and over, doesn't it mean something?"

"Not necessarily. Repeating conditions makes for repeating outcomes."

"But, yes. I do think these could be premonitions."

They sat together under the full moon for what could have been hours.

"What if we don't win," Eragon said.

Arya did not reply and Eragon looked at her. She was looking up at the stars and the pinpoints of light reflected in her eyes perfectly. The wash of the moonlight bathed her face in radiance and rich shadows. Her dark hair tumbled down her back and shoulders like a black waterfall.

"If we cannot topple Galbatorix, we will leave."

"What?"

"We will leave to Alalëa or any other country we are unaware of. We cannot remain in Alagesia if the next few months do not render victory."

With a shiver, Eragon remembered Angela's prediction in Teirm- how she had said that he would leave and never again set foot in Alagesia. Her predictions have come true so far, thinking of the witch's predictions about Brom, the flight to the Varden, and Murtagh. The last is I will never again set foot in Alagesia. The others came true, why wouldn't that one? Plus, she said it would happen even I tried to avoid it.

"By ourselves," he said, "that might be dangerous."

The smallest of smiles flickered across Arya's mouth. "No, Eragon. Not by ourselves."

"Who else would go? Roran and Katrina, maybe. But I don't know that Roran would want to leave Carvahall behind and Katrina certainly wouldn't want to leave Roran; for any reason. Who would leave behind Alagesia with us?"

"Others would come." Eragon focused his gaze onto her more intently.

"What are you hiding so cryptically? Who would abandon Alagesia for the uncertain sea?"

The smile on her face spread. She took his right hand and placed it on her stomach. There was a moment of pause and then Eragon felt something inside of her kick. He narrowed his eyes as he tried to think past his nightmare at what that meant. Then, as the answer came to him, he forgot how to breathe. She leaned over to him and whispered, "Our son will."

Hurray, very thinly veiled foreshadowing. Don't worry. The dream Eragon had won't happen for an entire book or so. By the way, am I the only one who thinks CP is taking way too long on the fourth book? テッサアウト