"Alright you dogs, listen up! We've had reports of a group of strangely clothed men and women traveling south, through the empire without being apprehended. So far, they have managed to avoid our patrols –but not anymore. Saddle your horses up! We are going to hunt them down and capture them, for the king!"
Unidentified group of empire cavalry-men, approximately eleven to twelve days after incursion of UNSC asset 2S-007
Aeraleth hissed through her bloodied teeth when her rider reached out to touch her wounded, heaving chest. The mere thought of anyone near her wound hurt her body even more than it already did and even though it concerned the only person she trusted with the task, she did not want to have him near her. The wound itself was gruesome enough, but her very instinct rebelled against someone touching it.
She had been stupid. So very stupid. Her rider had warned her away multiple times, but she hadn't listened. She had been too stupid to listen...and she had ended up paying the price for it. When the Urgals had gone and surrounded her rider, she had feared for his life. He had been capable of easily killing half a hundred of them single-handedly and unarmed but had still thought that he would end up hurting himself. She simply hadn't wanted to leave him. So she touched down once again, refused to leave his side and fought alongside him –not realizing that her combat-prowess was not enough for her to stay her ground in such an overwhelming group of enemies.
The dragon whimpered and slowly lowered her body to the ground, her limbs starting to lose the energy they needed to keep her upright. She hurt so much. It was as if her chest was on fire, her innards filled with frost and her brain working against herself in an attempt to lull her into sleep. Never in her life had she felt so much pain and she instantly knew that this had to be what death felt like. Not just the burning agony of pain, or the searing pain that she had felt when the wolves had torn at their wings. This felt worse...this felt like death seeping into her marrows, draining her energy out until there remained no more.
She had been too blind to notice the group of urgals approaching her rear and without Maine there to defend her, the monstrosities had been able to hack at her legs, crippling her in her fight against the overwhelming waves of enemies.
"Stay with me," Her rider told her. He sounded like he was stuck underneath a waterfall...his voice was weak and distant.
Or that could be her having difficulties concentrating. She knew that she had made a mistake and she was paying for it. She had ignored the words of her rider, who had more experience in combat than she had. He was her superior in the hunt and she had gone and ignored him, thinking that he was still a child. But she had been wrong...her impatient sense of superiority had merely ended with her dying of a stab-wound to her chest.
"Aeraleth, focus!" Maine snapped at her as he stood next to her, his arms hanging limb next to his body and his black helmet staring at her bleeding frame. She had been stabbed in her chest by a long, thin sword that had penetrated through her sturdy ribs and she couldn't help but try to comfort her rider. He looked so helpless...
Aeraleth didn't want to die. She was barely a few weeks old and there were so many things to look forward to for her. But...she also knew when to stop struggling in vain. Her mistake had killed her. She had failed to protect her rider from the shade.
Her tongue flicked against her teeth and she exhaled painfully, trying to find some way to ease the raging pain in her side.
There was none.
Blood was dripping to the ground as she tried to get up again, but her limbs had no strength left. Her life's blood was slowly sipping away and there was nothing that she or her rider could do to help her, or even ease her pain.
He was a force of nature that could only destroy, not repair. He could dish out and take, but not take away.
"Maine..." She weakly told him, gathering all of her energy to speak to him. She knew what would happen to any creature in a rider-dragon bond if one of them passed away. It was a mutually assured death and only the strongest of individuals would survive such a shock...only to slip into insanity moments later. She couldn't have that.
"Aeraleth, hold on," Her human snapped at her and ran his cold, hard gloves over her side.
She couldn't prevent a shiver going down her spine. She felt so very cold...so very cold. She wanted to close her eyes and give in to the torrents of pain and blackness, but she could not. She could not yet leave her rider. But she was so tired.
The urgals were gone. The ground was absolutely littered with their bodies, blood and bodily fluids. Her rider had fought well...and so had she. Together they had bested the beasts...and the shade, for her beloved human was still alive and what remained of her vision was devoid of the dreaded female.
"Look at me!" Maine ordered her. "Stay with me!"
She couldn't keep her eyes open. The pain was slowly seeping away, making place for a warm fuzzy feeling that replaced the cold within her body. Was this what death felt like? If so, it wasn't as terrifying as she had thought it to be.
And then a sharp, bitter sensation spread throughout her chest, originating at the wound where the blade was sticking out of. Her rider was busy pulling the weapon out a few inches, tearing her out of her stupor with new and fresh waves of agony. What was he doing to her?
She felt a trickle of energy seeping into her body, which quickly intensified and became a river. It was coming from her partner-of-mind –he was pouring his energy into her wounded body, trying to preserve her life.
'Maine...' She softly told him. 'Don't...' He had wasted enough of his energy already. Ten days walking with barely anything to eat or drink, followed by half day of test and then hours of nonstop battle. That was his life with her and it would kill him if he did not think about himself. He needed to throw his desire to protect all but himself away and think for once. He could not afford to waste the energy to heal a dragon.
But the human ignored her. As the Varden's soldiers around them reorganized, tended to their dead and wounded and cleared the area, her rider sat by her side and fed her a constant trickle of energy that just managed to prevent her from falling over the edge of life and into the maws of death.
She couldn't understand how he did that. He had to have his limits...there was no way for him to be able to keep her alive for so...long? Was it long?
Aeraleth had lost her control over time. She could no longer sense if her rider was keeping her alive for a few minutes or a few hours. All that she knew was the bitter agony in her chest and the dark numbness in her limbs.
Her once so sensitive ears could barely discern anything at that point. Her surroundings had been reduced to a grey blur and faint whispers. She was barely aware of a few humans gathering around them, but they did not approach. Why was that? Where they afraid?
"This will sting," Maine's voice suddenly cut through the tiring silence and fresh explosion of pain sparked through her chest, eliciting a loud roar from deep down her throat. Or at least she thought it to be a loud roar, but all that she heard was a soft and weak growl.
Her rider had pulled the sword out of her chest with one swift movement, drenching the ground with blood that came pouring out of the open wound. But he immediately clasped a hand over her wound and the secure grip prevented any more of her life's source to drip out. The bloodied sword clattered to the ground and the sounds of metal striking stone echoed rather loudly through her skull.
It hurt.
Her rider whispered a few words and the constant flow of energy shifted at his will, turning and shifting and making its way towards her ruined chest-cavity. There it started to expand, pulsing and changing until each and every single tendril was embedded into her flesh. At that point, her flesh started to itch and the burning transferred itself to her blood, making the pain of her injury feel much more urgent, but also strangely lifted.
What was he doing? Was he performing magic on her? After having kept her alive with nothing but the force of his own life? The boy was foolish! He would kill himself!
'Maine...leave...me be...you must live...' She tried to urge him, but even though he had allowed her thoughts to slip into his mind, he did not pay her any mind. Why was he blocking the rest of her mind out? What was he hiding from her?
The Spartan increased the pressure on her chest and she sharply inhaled through her teeth as a new wave of pain crashed into her. He was healing her body, but only at the surface. He was mending her skin and flesh but ignoring the damage on her insides. Did he not hold enough knowledge to do otherwise? Or was he spending the energy more wisely than she had thought?
"Next time," He told her matter-of-factly without stopping his attempts to repair her, "you will follow my orders. You're no good to me dead."
Aeraleth exhaled softly, feeling her still-beating heart warm with pride and happiness. He wasn't thinking that she was going to die; he solemnly believed that she would live!
She closed her eyes without trying to give in to the darkness again. Her rider had her life in his hands and she didn't want to be protected by anyone else now. He would save her and in turn, she would save him.
The dragoness pledged to herself that she would do better in the future. Had she died, she would have only increased the agony and pain of her rider. Death was not important to him, but she was. He would die before allowing anything to happen to her and by rushing mindlessly into battle, she had insulted his way of combat. She would not dishonor him like that.
She continued to bear the itching feeling of her flesh being mended by the steady flow of magic and patiently tried to establish a new contact with the mind of her rider. He was still blocking her out for some reason...he didn't even dare risk communicating mentally with her. Why was that? Was he afraid of enemy spellcasters? Or was he afraid that he would hurt her?
His energy was consistent and potential: her wound healed faster than she had thought possible and soon, what remained of the deep gash in her body had been reduced to a mere patch of bare flesh. It hurt to breathe, but it would prevent her from bleeding to death.
And that would be enough. Her body could heal on its own after this.
"I closed the wound to prevent further bleeding, but you have considerable internal damage. You need someone more capable to heal you. We need the elf."
That surprised her. Arya hated her Maine and he wasn't so fond of the elf himself. While she had no real quarrel with the elf, she did not like the way she treated her bonded partner. And the soldier never allowed anyone to interfere with something he could do himself, so why would he ask for the help of someone else? Was her condition so dire?
She tried contacting him again and found it easier to do so now that she wasn't plagued by constant agony.
But before she could actually formulate a sentence, her rider started talking again.
"Back off."
What was that? Who was he warning away?
Aeraleth opened her eyes and slowly craned her neck to the side, getting a better view of her surroundings. She was lying on the stone floor, with her tail draped weakly across a few rocks. A thick pool of crimson blood had collided with a larger pool of black fluids, creating a morbidly fascinating image on the floor. Her rider was –again- absolutely coated in the stuff. A few soldiers had finally approached him, but they had their weapons drawn and they smelled of absolute fear.
She heard a metallic click and watched as her rider pointed his smallest weapon at the humans that were his allies. 'Maine...be calm. These are our allies,' she warned her rider, thinking that he was confused at their allegiance.
"She's been taken care of. Back off or I will open fire!"
He was giving the soldiers a chance to surrender. That was something new. And judging by their reactions, they weren't as stupid as to ignore that.
They backed off like good little humans.
She lowered her head and spotted a lone, dark figure lying on the ground. Blood stuck to her bare skin and her clothing did not do anything to hide her ample frame from those who beheld her.
Aeraleth growled softly and tried to get to her feet, anger and fear rousing themselves from deep within her heart. The Shade was still alive! She was alive and lying right next to her rider! She needed to save him!
Wait...why was her partner-of-mind guarding the Shade? Had she surrendered to him? And...had he accepted that surrender? Impossible!
'Maine,' She told her rider, 'the Shade...is there. Why...is she...?'
"She's my prisoner," He calmly explained and then rose from his crouched position.
And he wobbled a bit on his feet. That wasn't good.
'Your...prisoner?'
He ignored her puzzled remark and then looked down at the prone form of the beaten Shade again. "It worked."
The shade whispered something back and her rider lowered his weapon.
"Let's go then."
'Maine!' She spoke again, trying to make her rider understand the urgency of the situation. Their mortal enemy was right there! 'She is evil! You must vanquish her!'
'Later,' He said back. 'For now, she will be our source of information. Can you move?'
Aeraleth felt too tired to argue with her rider and instead tried to get her limbs to obey her will. 'Barely. What now?'
Her rider did not immediately respond. Instead, he looked down at the ground and clenched his fists. The gesture was...odd. "The urgals are retreating. Eragon is fighting the other shade-"
"Durza is dead," The female shade suddenly spoke. Her voice was completely different form the last time Aeraleth had heard her speak; instead of sounding arrogant or condescending, she now sounded careful and sorrowful. What had changed in the foul creature? Was she biding her time so that she could strike back at Maine or had the spirits inside of her body been broken by his will? "I felt the captured spirits fade away."
"You need a medic."
She understood that her refusing to follow her rider's orders had nearly been her end. And it still could be. She would not disobey him immediately again. Besides; refusing help when it was offered was stupid. 'I agree.'
Her rider then reached out and grabbed the Shade by her throat, lifting her in the air with ease. "Don't try anything," he barked at her as he set her down and spun around so that he could aim his weapon at the back of her head.
The shade did not reply, but she also didn't throw Maine any dirty looks or other threatening signals. What had changed in her that she could prevent herself from doing that?
Aeraleth groggily rose to her full size and wavered slightly. She had almost no strength left in her limbs, but if her rider needed her to move she would move. She was a dragon, so she should be able to handle it.
'What did I miss?' She asked her rider as the two of them plus the Shade marched towards the dwarf-den. Maine was walking ahead of her, still holding a weapon trained directly at the head of the redheaded female. He was a curious case; his mind felt unlike any of the minds around her. It was not human, not elven and not dwarven. It was completely and utterly strange...but it simply was. It was the mind of her partner-of-heart and she accepted him for who he was.
But she had to admit that he was too strange for her to simply ignore it. Only his speech was human, as he talked in the same language that the other humans spoke and his words lacked the elegance and poetry of that of the elves. The problem was that his body was capable of feats far beyond that of most living beings: he was stronger than Kull, faster than elves and fiercer than dragons. His mind was stuck, fluctuating between feeling like a pond without a single ripple or a great storm in a desert, tearing down entire mountains by simply being near. He did not make sense –he was impossible.
As Aeraleth watched the soldier move, another issue rose in her still-sleepy mind. He was always wearing his armour in battle. Now she hadn't ever felt how heavy plates around her body felt, but she could imagine that it wasn't really comfortable. Yet he managed to move with uncanny elegance, as if the armour was a part of his body.
Well...until recently. He still retained most of that inhuman elegance, but his movements were less fluid. More jerky and chaotic.