Harry woke up in a bad mood. Nothing could go right that morning. He fell down trying to get from his bed to his wheelchair. Frustrated with his injured body and his own clumsiness, Harry was practically enraged by the dozens of tries it took to complete his morning routine without help. He locked and silenced his door bitterly and refused any help.

The indignity of it all was infuriating. Vulnera sanentur helped a lot less than he'd hoped. Something about the way his skin wasn't cut or gone, just scarred, confused the spell. He had nothing for the pain, either. Harry knew a very specific few spells that treated combat wounds. He knew how to brew burn paste, but without dragon blood, what was the point?

He was not about to go begging Saphira for some more blood to fix himself.

Harry was so angry that he refused to call Mungo. Crawling away to someone else to solve his problems felt like surrendering to his injuries. He knew he would have to ask eventually, but the notion of being incapable of anything incensed him too much to endure the indignity when he already felt incapable of everything.

Furthermore, Misha and the twins hovered over his mind like storm clouds. His hatred for the twins was eclipsed only by hatred for himself for missing it. They made no pretenses about the sort of people they were, the only thing they'd lied about was their allegiance. And Misha! Hadn't Harry done everything he could for him? Hadn't Harry given Misha every reason to be loyal? Why on earth would he choose the twins over him!?

It made him angry in a way that stuck around. Every time his mind turned back to those traitors, his mood plunged straight back into the ground.

Harry couldn't help but play it all back in his mind over and over again. Had Misha given him any sign, any reason to distrust him? His mother's condition was the only thing that came to mind, and Harry would bet that was true. She had to be the last one on the plane. So then maybe Misha had not betrayed them so much as been forced by the twins who had his mother hostage.

His mind was caught in cycles of self loathing and regret, wondering if there was any other outcome to the battle of Farthen Dûr that left Maria alive.

The alert ward on the door pinged Harry while he was trying to brush his teeth.

"What?" Harry snapped, before remembering nobody outside could hear him through the muffling charm. He conjured crutches and struggled to the door. His armpits burned under the handles of the crutches. Harry didn't even bother trying to put clothes on the normal way; he conjured them straight onto his body.

Harry leaned his armpit into his right crutch and reached for the doorknob. He ripped open the door and glared. "What?"

It was Orik. Harry dropped the height of his gaze to the dwarf. He gave Harry an odd look. There was a watermelon-sized bag under his arm, wrapped in canvas. "Do you have a moment?"

Harry grunted and waved a crutch into the room, turning away. He knit his brows and conjured a chair. Orik startled.

"You're doing that without a gesture," he noted. "It's a lot more surprising without warning."

He made another noncommittal, grouchy sort of noise in his throat.

"You're out of your wheelchair," Orik tried. "That's good news."

"For this very brief moment," Harry muttered. He fell into the chair. "What's up, Orik?"

"I am no mind reader, but I would guess something is on your mind," Orik ventured. Harry conjured him his own chair. He startled only slightly less the second time. The dwarf sat with a nod of gratitude. "I doubt I will ever truly get used to that," he murmured.

Harry sighed. "Just how everything happened."

"I heard one of your staff was murdered in the twins' betrayal," Orik said sincerely. "You have my sympathies."

Harry didn't meet his eyes. "Thanks. She was a friend."

Orik straightened up in his chair. Harry got the sense he was about to say something important.

"King Hrothgar is a fair king," he started. That sounded worrisome to Harry. "A fair king honors the deeds of others," Orik went on. That banished some of the nerves.

"The Isidar Mithrim is the heart of our race," the dwarf said. "It is a perfect representation of our beliefs, our skills, and our passions. It is the icon of the dwarven nation. It is hard to describe to someone who is not a dwarf. The star sapphire is an icon, the apex of our civilization. It's the greatest thing we have produced. Harry, saving it from destruction has won you endless favors."

"I've seen," Harry said, trying to keep the sourness out of his voice. "They practically bow to me in the streets."

Orik's face was solemn. "Let that be a way to understand how much your deed means. The fact that you saved the library is of greater functional importance, yet far less circulated. That he will grant you endless favors is implicit; King Hrothgar is expected to make a visible gesture to reward you."

"Did you bring me a big lump of gold?" Harry asked, nodding at the thing wrapped under Orik's arm.

"Nothing so crude," Orik averred. "King Hrothgar was under the impression you had no need of gold."

Harry rested his neck on the back of his chair. He was right about that. He indicated Orik should continue. Public gestures of gratitude weren't very fun. Harry thought he might be allergic.

Orik unwrapped the package. It was a helmet. A very nice helmet, with a hammer surrounded by thirteen stars on the forehead.

"I appreciate it, but I don't really wear helmets," Harry said awkwardly. He hated the way it cut down on his vision.

"We will find some other piece for you to wear, then," Orik promised. "This is not just a helmet. King Hrothgar is offering to adopt you into Durgrimst Ingeitum. His clan and mine."

Harry knit his brows. "I'm a little old to be getting adopted. I can take care of myself." But Orik's expression gave him pause. There was more to this. It was a big deal.

"A deed such as yours begs a response of similar magnitude," Orik explained. "This is no mere fostering. King Hrothgar is offering to make you, in the eyes of our laws and our people, a dwarf, entitled therein to all rights, responsibilities, secrets, and privileges."

Harry paused. "This is a big deal."

"Very," Orik confirmed.

He considered. "Do I have to answer right now?"

Orik shook his head. "Not this very second, but before you leave Tarnag, so that King Hrothgar can find some other suitable gesture."

"Did he offer the same to Eragon?" Harry wondered. Eragon had been right there with him, fighting Durza at least.

"He did not save the star sapphire," Orik reminded Harry. "That is what you are being honored for. King Hrothgar did consider Eragon, though, but decided against offering. Not because he thought Eragon was unworthy, but because Eragon made it clear to Ajihad that he intended to be an impartial champion of the whole coalition, and intended to stay separate from factions."

That tracked. The question now was if Harry was willing to give up his own impartiality. He rather liked doing his own thing. He did not like the idea of being beholden to a new King when he didn't know any of the rules or expectations.

"Can you tell me more about what that entails?" Harry asked Orik. "I want to know what rules I'd be signing up to follow, what authority King Hrothgar would have over me, stuff like that."

"King Hrothgar would not presume to order you around," Orik assured him. "This is not a trick. This is a genuine gift. You would be visibly aligning yourself with the dwarves, and the only true responsibility you'd be expected to follow is in giving proper burial to dwarves that die in your company."

Harry was not concerned with burying any dwarves that died around him. He could handle that. Being 'visibly aligned with the dwarves' was what gave him pause. Harry was not blind to the impact he was having in Alagaesia. He did not think it would be good for the world to let the dwarves monopolize the benefits of that impact. He didn't think King Hrothgar would feel entitled to special treatment by him, but it would look bad. Harry knew how easily the Rita Skeeters of the world could turn his image with ammunition like that.

"I'll think about it," Harry promised. He would, but he didn't expect his answer to change. His mind was occupied these days. Orik's expression told Harry the dwarf had guessed as much.

"Of course. King Hrothgar has assigned me to be available to you and Eragon while we are in Tarnag if you have questions or require a guide," Orik said. "I understand in your current circumstances, you may wish to be left alone–"

"It's fine," Harry crabbed. He transfigured the chair into a wheelchair. "I need to get outside anyways."

Orik was probably willing to push Harry's wheelchair, but it was not so difficult to enchant it to drive itself. Harry rolled carefully through the packed, chattering halls of Ûndin's manor. Dwarves and Varden alike made way for him and Orik.

The dwarves that murmured as he passed had started converging on a common mantra. 'Nos Isidar,' they said to him, bowing as he passed.

Harry glanced at Orik. "Star bearer," the dwarf translated.

Harry's lips quirked. Pretentious, but it almost actually fit. Certainly better than 'Boy-who-lived.'

"Did Eragon get one?"

"Shadeslayer," Orik grinned.

"Awesome," Harry said, smiling. "I don't think he had a last name before." But the smile faded fast.

Orik helped him down the front steps. He was a lot stronger than his size suggested.

Harry blinked in the late summer sun. Brom was in the courtyard arguing heatedly with a group of white robed dwarves. He rolled over.

"Whether you believe or not is immaterial," one who looked in charge said heatedly. "The supplies are given to us, we will use them in the best way for our people's prosperity. You have done enough, Brom."

"They are not yours, you do not produce or transport them," Brom snapped. "It is not your labor to decide–" Brom caught sight of Harry and seized the opportunity.

"Harry. What conditions would you put on the food you are giving the dwarves?" he asked.

Harry frowned. The white robed dwarves all turned to him. A moment of awe passed as they all realized who they were looking at. Harry waited through the familiar moment when someone new realized that he was that person, really, and how odd it was to actually get to meet him, before their brains rebooted and they remembered how social interactions worked.

"Er, conditions? It's free," he said, confused.

"For use," Brom grumped.

"Uh, it has to be free, it has to be distributed fairly, and you can't waste it," Harry supposed.

"The dwarven priests want to sacrifice a portion of your supplies to their gods," Brom said irritably. "It is hard enough to transport enough food merely to feed everyone while Harry is injured, nevermind a portion extra to waste on wishful thinking."

Scowling, the lead dwarf grew furious. "The greatest of our holdings has been destroyed as a result of an invasion you and your kin motivated the Black King to send. The gods must be appeased or that will be only the first disaster to befall Alagaesia!"

Harry turned to Orik for a solution. This bickering felt pointless and foolish. They had bigger things to worry about. The food was not finite – which if any god was paying attention, probably made it a lousy sacrifice – but it did require labor from two busy, important, and valuable people. Wasting the food was more akin to wasting Brom's and Arya's time than any material sacrifice. Harry would rather indulge the idiot than endure the annoyance.

Orik spread his hands. "I cannot gainsay one of Durgrimst Quan in matters of religion. If you wish to learn more, Celbedeil is the heart of our religion, and it is hardly an hour's walk that way." He pointed up the valley over the miles of tents towards the top of a hill, where magnificent marble domes, towers, and temples soared over vibrant gardens. If you wish to learn of our beliefs, there is no better place."

Harry did not want to go very much. He did not want to do anything more than sit in bed and wait for the days to pass, so that maybe it would hurt less to be awake. But if staying meant mediating between an irascible man and an irrational dwarf, he would let Orik take him on a tour of a nice looking area around Tarnag.

At about that time, Eragon came back from the inn down the road from Ûndin's manor that housed all the Varden staff who weren't important to get a room in the manor itself.

Harry spared a thought to wondering who he was talking to before Orik offered the tour of Celbedeil to Eragon too. Arya materialized as well, though Brom said he was too busy to go.

Orik led the three of them up the valley and into Celbedeil.

On the way, Harry's mind was back in the workshop, running through that fateful final minute over and over. Arya gave him concerned looks and probably would have said something if Eragon and Orik hadn't been with them.

Even once they got there, Harry had a hard time bringing himself to care about the architecture and art. He saw the nice shapes with his eyes, but did not feel the beauty of it.

Harry listened with half an ear as Orik found a tour guide who described their deities and their domains, the history of the world according to dwarves, and their description of the afterlife.

Morgothol, supposedly the maker of dragons with his brother Urûr, welcomed the honorable dead into his hall to feast for eternity with all the other dwarves. It wasn't clear if humans were welcome in this afterlife. Harry wasn't sure the idea even sounded all that attractive.

Sitting at a table forever, stuck in a hall and never able to go outside, nothing to do but eat, it sounded boring. He imagined Maria in that hall sitting with her chin on her fist as some dwarf chattered at her in Dwarvish, waiting for her husband and kids to die eventually so she'd have someone to talk to.

Harry felt the band of his ring against his skin. He was very aware of its presence. It was the first time since Fred's advice that Harry had been tempted. He was too nervous to do it, though. He couldn't stomach the possibility that Maria might hate him or blame him. So he ignored the resurrection stone altogether.

Instead, he listened to a dwarf named Gannel, who was apparently very important, blather on about deities creating races and living rocks and whatever other nonsense he thought he had to say to get Harry to hand over a whole bunch of food.

He was sourly disposed towards the whole deal of Dwarvish religion by what he saw at Celbedeil. The buildings were immaculate, decorated with precious gems and metals and artwork depicting religious scenes. Celbedeil was busy (though Harry did not know if that was out of the ordinary) but it was nothing like Tarnag, which was packed wall to wall with dwarves.

Celbedeil, apparently, was too sacred to help out much with the refugee crisis. The dirty masses did not belong in Celbedeil.

Arya shared his mild distaste for the place. She had her 'ambassador face' on, but Harry was beginning to recognize her tells. She was too polite, even as she poked holes in Gannel's stories. Orik was torn between offense and bemusement listening to her calmly disassemble the dwarven priest's arguments.

"Life can be detected everywhere else, even in the air," Arya told Gannel. "Magicians skilled enough with their minds can find invisibly tiny creatures that float on the wind. Only dense, non-porous stone is truly lifeless."

"Not so!" Gannel insisted. "Only dwarven priests can detect life in ordinary stone. Coral–"

"Isn't a rock," Harry pointed out. Arya closed her mouth and glanced back at him, surprised.

Gannel frowned. "Of course it is."

"No, it's not," Harry repeated. This was something he'd learned about from both Snape and Hagrid. "It's an exoskeleton, kind of. If you're seeing anything alive in coral, it's the polyps that secrete the limestone coral. That's how it grows. If you take it out of water, it will die very quickly."

"Just as taking a fish out of water will kill it," Gannel said matter-of-factly.

Arya's lips twitched. She sent him a sparkling look. "Divers have managed to locate the polyps within a coral. Only dwarf priests are supposed to be able to detect life in the exoskeleton, I suppose."

Gannel was eager to shift the conversation away from disprovable facts. Harry caught what he was doing. The petty schadenfreude of making the priest squirm cut through the listlessness, and Harry and Arya continued to tag team Gannel as he moved on.

Eragon asked intelligent questions himself, yet Harry could tell a lot of the holes he and Arya poked in religion in general had him scratching his head and reevaluating. Harry knew Eragon was uneducated, but he would not make the mistake of assuming he was stupid. The kid was sharp, learned fast, and asked insightful questions.

"So the world is eight thousand years old?" Eragon questioned. "Absolutely everything was created eight thousand years ago?"

Gannel nodded. "So say our historians as well."

Harry cleared his throat. Gannel seemed to be dreading what he had to say. "That cannot be true."

Arya was surprised as well.

"What do you mean?" Gannel asked. Eragon was curious as well.

"Just the way planets form and life evolves," Harry said vaguely. "It takes way longer than that. Billions of years."

Gannel choked and started laughing. Eragon was similarly taken aback, even Arya was shocked. Though unlike Gannel and Eragon, her eyes were wide. She believed him.

"Excuse me," Gannel said, clearing his throat. "And you claim the gods are hard to believe."

Harry shrugged. "It is what it is. Where I'm from, our technology is really good. We have ways of figuring out how old stuff is, even rocks. There's a way to measure how long it's been since a rock formed. Scientists took samples from asteroids, deep in the ocean, the moon, and from really old mountain ranges and dated them to figure it out."

"The moon?" Eragon scoffed. Gannel looked just as cynical.

Harry realized his mistake. "Never mind that," he backtracked. "It's not the only indication. The Sun and planets form out of a swirling disc of dust from the last star to explode. Gravity makes all that protoplanetary material coalesce into planets, but they start out as a gigantic ball of lava. It takes hundreds of millions of years for the surface to cool off and become solid land. Miles beneath us, the planet's still lava all the way through."

Truly, Astronomy class had never been so useful to Harry.

"Billions of years, stars exploding, rocks from the moon," Gannel listed. "Is this the religion your people believe in?"

Harry shook his head. "There's a few different religions–"

"But this is the one you believe in?" Gannel pressed.

"No– well, yes, but–" Harry growled. "It's not a religion because we can prove it."

"Aha!" Gannel seized. "So can we. You simply don't accept our proof."

Harry rolled his eyes. "Your entire religion falls apart if I can find one thing older than eight thousand years. Pick up literally any smooth rock from a riverbed. It was rounded by tens of millions of years of water rushing past it, tumbled smooth by sediment in the water. How is a rock rounded by nature within eight thousand years?"

"They grow that way," Gannel said. He didn't seem convinced. Harry felt a stab of triumph.

"Has no one ever found a bone in the ground made from stone?" he wondered. "Fossilization is another process that takes over ten thousand years." Harry glanced around at the small crowd that had gathered around them, listening to him speak. He could see from the reactions that they had.

Harry shrugged, a bit self-conscious. He felt like he was preaching. He supposed Celbedeil was the place to do it. "It's just that eight thousand years is far too short. There's far too much evidence to the contrary. Rocks especially are millions of years old. You can't go into your exploration of the world with your mind already made up on what's right, and look for reasons to prove the rest of the world wrong. You have to take the evidence you find and be honest with your interpretations. The people where I'm from prefer to admit they don't know something and pursue the answer, rather than insist they have the right answers and refuse to keep searching."

That landed awkwardly with the assembled dwarves. Harry glanced around and felt a sense of vertigo as he was again reminded of what a privilege it was to have lived in a time when all this stuff was figured out, and where that information was widely circulated.

Even if none of the dwarves believed him enough to unseat the doctrines they'd been taught since they were children, Harry would bet planting the seeds of doubt was enough. It only took finding one thing older than eight thousand years to make the dwarven faith start reexamining things.

"If you are interested in history as recorded by dwarves," Gannel said finally, "There is a temple that may interest you especially, Nos Isidar."

They followed Gannel down a paved garden path to a long colonnade. It was built to contour against the wall of the valley, and started pressed up against Farthen Dûr at the end of the valley. Thousands of columns supported an awning that shaded something multicolored which Harry could not make out at their distance.

Gannel took Eragon, Orik, and Arya, and him on a wide route towards the front of the colonnade. Arya was giving Harry odd looks. He shot her a questioning glance. She shook her head and gestured for him to follow the dwarf.

At the beginning of the colonnade was the dwarven creation myth. Darkness, then a planet created by six beautiful beings, each taking up several meters on the enamelled surface of the mural. The colors were vivid and rich.

"Guntera," Gannel indicated the first deity, a male with the vague build of a very muscular elf. He wore a crown of stars with the moon set in the center. The mural was made so the crown looked like the night sky itself. "King of the gods, ruler of all." In his hands was a dark circle.

Next was Kili, Guntera's wife.

Like Guntera, she was of the daylit sky, a sun set in her crown of azure, boundless sky. She added light to the circle, a sun and sky that lit the blank surface of the newborn world.

"Helzvog," Gannel explained next, "God of the earth and its molten depths."

Harry got a Hephaestus vibe from Helzvog. He was a smith, he was short and built like a dwarf, his expression was one of power and authority. He stood upon the formless surface, forging mountains for the world.

Next was Morgothol. "God of fire," Gannel said. "He warms the heart of the world." The mural reflected Gannel's words, a proud, handsome featured face beneath the nascent world, breathing fire into the heart of the earth.

Urûr was his twin brother, god of the sky and winds. The two brothers stared at each other from opposite sides of the thin strip of earth.

Finally, Sindri made all the plants and animals, according to the dwarves. She looked like Mother Earth, a human with clothes made out of plants, roots, and animals.

"She brought life to the world," Gannel said. "Plants and lesser animals. The six gods were unsatisfied with a world that was uninhabited. They thought Sindri's lesser creatures were not grand enough to live on this world alone. So the six of them worked together to bring forth a great race of beings built in their image."

The murals went on to depict giants, who turned on the gods in a war they lost. They illustrated the gods making the Beors from the bones of the fallen giants, and Guntera's edict that none of the gods were to make more races to inhabit Alagaesia.

The very next frame was of Helzvog disobeying and creating the first dwarf from stone.

Angry and prideful, Guntera created the elves to outdo Helzvog. Harry could have guessed from there what the other gods did, just by how they were drawn into the enamel and who they resembled.

Sure enough, Morgothol and Urûr made dragons out of fire and wind, and Sindri made humans out of dirt.

"Did Kili make Urgals?" Eragon asked.

Gannel made a face. "We do not claim them. None of our gods would create such creatures. No, Kili was the only one to restrain herself. She did not make a race."

"So then there are more gods out there?" Harry supposed. It followed, according to what Gannel had said.

"Maybe so," Gannel said. "The Urgals surely worship some fell deity. Humans have many more gods than dwarves."

Eragon nodded along with that. Harry would have to ask him about them. It felt like a pretty flimsy answer. He did not have to think very hard to understand the problems the answer presented. The dwarves claimed their deities made all the major races of Alagaesia, yet if they acknowledged the validity of human gods, surely they had a different creation story that conflicted.

That was the problem, Harry supposed, with having all powerful gods. If they created everything, the gods had to be responsible for all the bad stuff, too. It was hardly fair of the dwarves to 'not claim' Urgals in their creation myth, and doing so undermined the validity of the whole story.

"What about werecats?" Harry asked, thinking about Solembum. "They seem pretty intelligent. Were they part of Sindri's first go at making life?"

"A matter of much debate," Gannel acknowledged. "Some say yes, others claim Kili circumvented her mate's edict by bestowing greater intelligence on the ordinary cats Sindri made before the giants."

At that point, the world was created and the story refocused on the dwarves, how they formed disparate tribes living around the Beors, the bloody wars between them, and eventually the formation of clans, then the first dwarven king, holding King Hrothgar's hammer, Volund, over his head.

There was a lot of history. The colonnade was well over a mile long, the whole thing done in vivid, artistic detail. It wasn't all dwarven history, either. Spans of the mural covered the arrival of elves to Alagaesia, the construction of Ilirea, a war between the elves and the dragons, the formation of the Riders, the arrival of humans, and so on.

Towards the end came a dark period for Alagaesia. Whoever had carved Galbatorix into the mural, they had to have seen the man. It was eerily accurate. Galbatorix hunched over a black dragon egg, unholy glee on his face. Harry's dreams had not gotten this far.

The following panels showed Galbatorix laying waste to the elves, driving dwarves out to the edges of the Beors, tearing dragons from the sky and tightening his fist around the humans at the heart of the continent. The Forsworn featured here too.

At the end, the mural did not terminate cleanly. History was still being made, Harry supposed. A crew of dwarves were already working on putting up columns and setting up the awning for the next stretch of mural.

A group of artists were sketching designs on the blank wall. Gannel brought them up to the artists and said something in Dwarvish. One of them glanced up, eyes widening at the sight of Harry.

"Nos Isidar!" he cried gleefully. Harry shifted under his intense gaze. The artist seemed to be trying to fix Harry's face in his mind perfectly, like he was trying to make a fairth.

"They would be honored if you would sit for them," Gannel translated after a moment of excited Dwarvish. "This next mural is yours, Nos Isidar. Yours and Eragon's."

Harry focused on the sketches the dwarves had scattered around. He could see the vision. A crimson-haired Durza backed by legions of faceless, horned warriors, marching on a Tronjheim. The panel was drawn such that Tronjheim appeared to be reaching up into the night sky, the star sapphire as the brightest rose red star in the sky.

In the next panel, Eragon stood over Durza, his red sword impaled through the Shade's heart. Tronjheim glowed in the background as it burned to the ground, consumed by a living serpent wrought from flame. The serpent's mouth reached for the star, but was snatched away.

Harry saw himself in the scene, holding that red star in his fist, flying on a broomstick from the flaming wreck, the serpent's tongue coiled around his leg, setting his cloak on fire.

It made him bitter. It was all very heroic, very dramatic. The dwarves had made him into some legendary character wounded in the climactic moment of Durza's demise, retrieving the precious star sapphire at cost to his own health.

"I wasn't burnt getting the star sapphire," Harry told the artist.

Orik translated for him. The dwarf frowned and leaned forward.

"He asks what happened," Orik relayed.

"I got burned chasing my own bloody plane," Harry scowled. "You can ask Hrothgar, I gave him the gem and he saw me still uninjured then. I went back for Maria."

Orik paused to give him a sympathetic look before translating. All the time Harry had distracted himself bickering with Gannel was wiped away at that reminder.

The artist nodded and with a few strokes of his pencil, altered the drawing. He flipped the sheet over and began sketching Harry's face. The dwarf was incredibly talented. Harry recognized himself within a minute. One of his colleagues was drawing Eragon, staring intently at the young Rider as he sketched. Eragon shifted on his feet uncomfortably.

The one drawing Harry looked up at him. He glanced to Orik and posed a question.

"Thrifk wants to know if either of you can come back and sit for them to render a better likeness," Orik relayed. "Nobody wants to impose, but it would be very valuable to the historical record," he added.

"He's right," Gannel said smoothly. "Eragon, your namesake was among the historical figures who sat for our artisans to better record the history of Alagaesia. This mural is meticulously restored and maintained to the best accuracy possible so that we never forget what came before us. Harry especially, you would honor us by allowing us to depict you with greater accuracy."

At the limit of his tolerance for Celbedeil for the day and unwilling to make a habit of returning, Harry summoned a sheet of paper to his hand and made a couple imprints of Eragon and himself.

"Thanks for having us," Harry said shortly. "It was pretty interesting."

On the way back, Harry was aware that the others had noticed his mood. It had sunk back to the low it had been at in the morning.

Orik, ever the diplomat, took note and bowed out. "I forgot to speak to Grimstborith Gannel about something. You can find your way back from here?"

Arya gave Eragon and Harry a lingering glance, then made her excuses to follow him back to Celbedeil. Harry opened his mouth to protest, then closed it. He would speak with her later. He hadn't had a moment alone with Eragon since he'd killed Durza.

Harry was left alone with Eragon.

The Rider had grown in the past weeks. There was no doubt about it. He was more confident.

"What did you think of Celbedeil?" Harry asked him.

Eragon thought for a moment. "Saphira didn't like it. She called it a mountain of gold on top of a mountain of wishful thinking."

Despite himself, Harry's lips twitched. That did sound like her.

"What about you? You don't believe in any gods?" Eragon asked.

Harry leaned back in his wheelchair and sighed. "I dunno. I don't, really. The more you know about the world, the less gods are necessary to explain it. There aren't many mysteries left to wizards, and what you'd call miracles are just as easily done by wizards. You're a magician now too. Is there anything your gods are supposed to do that you can do now?"

Eragon blew through his lips, blowing his bangs off his forehead. Harry felt a pang of irritated jealousy at the idea of having hair again, and the fact that Eragon was copying his nervous tic now that he couldn't do it himself.

"Some," he admitted. "I don't strongly believe in any god. Carvahall has a handful of different ones. I'm not very religious, but the idea of no gods? That's a new idea to me. Who do you thank when times are good? Who do you blame when bad things happen? Who is responsible for the world if no god exists to shoulder the blame?"

"That's something my world would find odd," Harry pointed out. What Eragon had said actually gave Harry a fair bit of insight. "Even the religious people usually don't blame god for bad stuff or credit him with good stuff. It's somebody's fault, or it's bad luck."

"Doesn't luck have to derive from someone?" Eragon wondered.

That sounded ridiculous to Harry. "Of course not. You can't say a god chose what numbers you got when you rolled dice," he said. "What does Saphira think?"

Eragon grinned. "Saphira thinks if there are such things as gods, they are dragons, and she does not care to entertain the notion of beings above them."

That was another very Saphira answer.

They went on in silence for a while. Distracted from thoughts of Maria and the twins, Harry found that briefly, he was able to enjoy the pleasant day. It was not too hot out, the sun was glorious and bright in the sky after so long under Farthen Dûr, the grassy hillside and cobbled paths reminded him of Hogwarts. He drew the Elder Wand and cast his patronus, thinking back to a moment just like this back in fifth year, on his way to visit Grawp with Hermione.

Eragon watched his spell. Harry felt like he'd done it right, yet no animal emerged. The white mist coalesced into a ball, but refused to form an animal. The misshapen, oblong ball was all he could produce. He gave it up and conjured a bunch of butterflies instead.

The swirl of flittering creatures landed on his arms and shoulders, every color of the rainbow present in their velvety wings.

"You are very privileged to have that sort of magic," Eragon observed. "Ours is better for killing than creating."

Harry brought a red and gold butterfly on his knuckle up to his eyes. The tiny creature was fearless, and did not fly away.

"You might not say that if you'd seen what it can do," Harry said. Thinking about it cut into his good mood.

"I have," Eragon reminded him. "I was there in Tronjheim when the fire started."

Harry raised his arms and let the butterflies take off into the valley.

"I just also saw it make a giant castle and fill it with art," Eragon went on. "And I've seen it save thousands of men's lives and feed thousands more. I can't imagine mine doing that."

Harry made a noncommittal noise. "What did you think about the mural?"

"All of it, or just the last bit?"

Harry shrugged.

Eragon took a moment to straighten his thoughts.

"It's amazing that they keep so much of the world's history in one place," he said. "After what you said about the gods and the age of the world and all that, it made me think they shouldn't have put their creation story on the wall if they wanted it to look as accurate as possible. People who don't believe in their gods are going to think the beginning is untrue, which is a disservice to the incredible commitment to accuracy and preservation that the latter part of the wall shows."

Harry agreed with the sentiment. It was religious art, and Merlin knew the Catholics and the Jews and the Muslims and the Hindus and every other religion had all made their fair share of transformative, groundbreaking discoveries and works based on their own faiths. But it was true that if someone started their history textbook with a bedtime story, it was going to lose credibility.

Maybe it was like Beedle the Bard's stories. A kernel of truth in the tall tale. No entity called Death had come to proclaim Harry its master, nor did Harry feel like he could control death in any meaningful way. Certainly, if he could, Maria would still be here. But the Hallows clearly existed, and in some way, Harry had overcome death himself by surviving killing curses and now being blasted by burning jet fuel.

Harry wondered if his cynicism was misplaced. He really knew nothing about Alagaesia. Refusing to entertain the dwarves' notion of religion was pretty stupid when he didn't know nearly enough to argue with them. Just because the Earth he grew up on was four billion years old, didn't mean this one was.

"What about the end?" Harry asked.

Eragon rubbed his forehead. "I feel honored and unworthy. I should not be on that mural. You kept the Urgals off us, you kept Durza busy so I could stab him, you even gave me the spell that let me see his heart. They have started calling me Shadeslayer, did you know that?"

Harry nodded. Eragon seemed to feel exactly as he did: unworthy. "Orik told me."

"All I did was stab him while he was distracted. Without your armor, I'd have died a hundred times," Eragon said, gazing into the past. "Even while Durza couldn't touch me, I couldn't beat him. Shadeslayer," he scoffed. "They should call me Glory Thief."

"What matters is that he was stopped," Harry said. Eragon glanced over at him questioningly. "I had a couple of perfect stabs. One while I was invisible and silenced, and he still managed to dodge. Arya tried the same thing with him in Gil'ead. I think he must've felt the wind of the sword coming. He's an amazing swordsman, too. I don't know if we would have had another opening if you hadn't stabbed him then. As long as we're friends, Eragon, you're always going to have help. Don't let that stop you from claiming your achievements."

An impish smile crept over Eragon's face. "You'll go by the dwarves' name for you then, Starbearer?" He bowed mockingly.

"Only if you do, Shadeslayer." Harry folded over in his chair, putting his head nearly between his knees in an effort to bow sitting down. "Certainly has a better ring to it than Glory Thief."

They walked for a while. Harry breathed the fresh mountain air in through his nose and watched the tents down in the valley ripple in time with the swaying trees and the waves on the lake. It was hard to be in a foul mood when a slice of heaven sat in front of him. The majesty of the Beors towered high over them, so tall it was difficult to see the sky without craning his head.

"The mural looked good," Eragon admitted. "If the mural really is eight thousand years old, and it lasts for eight thousand more, your face and mine will be there long after Carvahall is dust and bones."

Harry sighed. The mere thought of her caught in his mind again and brought down his mood. "It doesn't tell the whole story."

Eragon took a moment to answer. "Your friend, right? Maria. I never met her."

"Ajihad sent her to me after you'd already come through the workshop. Arya met her once," Harry remembered. Eragon nodded.

"Most of my staff were friendly, but we were just working together. Maria felt like an actual friend," Harry admitted. "The mural made me think about what happened. I grabbed the star sapphire because I felt guilty about Tronjheim. That Durza could use my magic was my fault. I asked Hrothgar what he would want saved most and that's what he told me. I went and emptied out the library, too. I wonder…"

Thoughts of what might've been whirled in his mind.

"What?" Eragon asked, curious. "Wonder what?"

"If I hadn't bothered, would I have been in time to save Maria," Harry sighed. He slumped in his wheelchair and stopped, without even the miniscule thread of willpower necessary to steer the self-driving enchantments.

Eragon spoke softly. "When Brom and I were at my step-father's castle, I had a thought about people and memories and death."

"Big thoughts," Harry remarked idly.

"Aye. I thought, everybody lives impossibly complex, meaningful, and detailed lives. Even if I spent every day and night telling you about myself for a month, every little detail, and you actually remembered it all, you'd still not know so much of me," Eragon said. "Even if I told you everything I remember, there are things about me even I don't know. Things I like and dislike, things I lie to myself about, memories I've forgotten. Everybody is like that. Nobody can tell you the full story."

Eragon sat on the ground opposite Harry and crossed his legs. "Life is so precious because when it ends, all of that disappears in an instant. It would take a thousand more dwarf murals to record just who Maria really was. Or my mother, or the unlucky few of the Varden's men that died in the battle."

"What's the point?" Harry asked, staring the younger man down.

He shrugged. "I don't know. I think I just feel like your friend is precious, and the memories of her you carry are just as irreplaceable as she herself is. I'd say treasure what you have left of her, and in the meantime, honor her by not letting them cast a shadow over your life."

Harry sighed again. When had everyone all got so bloody wise? Everybody had something precious to say all of a sudden. Dumbledore would agree with Eragon; he'd practically said the same thing. Arya would want him to be happy as well.

Harry didn't want to be happy. He didn't want to be over the turmoil of Maria's death, he wanted her to be alive and he worried that if he stopped clinging to the despair of her passing, he wouldn't want her back so much. He wouldn't care as much anymore.

But for Eragon, for Dumbledore, for Arya, and maybe just a tiny bit for himself, Harry was willing to try.

AN: I didn't love how this chapter came together, it felt like I was kind of rambling along. I liked the conversations the characters had, but the plot did not really advance at all. More on that next chapter.

Harry already went through a lot of angst for feeling sad over killing those guards in Gil'ead, so you all will be spared too much angst for Harry's newest tragedy. Let nobody say I am not merciful.

It also took longer to put out because I didn't even ask Scarze to beta it until chapter 57 was done, since I usually send him 2 chapters at a time, and 56 has given me an even tougher time. Between starting the next arc and having to do the plotting, starting another semester of college (this time with 5 classes instead of 3) and Minecraft, Overwatch, Apex Legends, and Fortnite Festival, I have not been writing as much as , this will be an unusually long break between chapters, and the next ones might come quicker.