The Grey Chronicles (Eragon fanfic) Book 1: Emergence

Chapter 7: Unexpected Losses

A.N: I am sooo sorry for not uploading chapters in so long. For those of you who are waiting patiently for me, thank you very much.

I have now managed to borrow a copy of Eldest from one of my good friends (thx Jackson!), so I can update properly. If Paolini were to see this, I hope he'll be proud.

I may linger in this book for a while longer, so be patient, people who want to see the end. There needs to be time for an elven romance in the works; Eragon and Arya belong together. How else do the dragons get together, anyway?

If you guys have any ideas with how this story goes, or if you want to point out some grammatical mistakes I missed, feel free to comment.

Enjoy!

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It had been two days since the strange conversation with Arya, and Jesse was on the training field.

Ajihad was organizing a party to hunt down pockets of Urgal groups that had escaped to the tunnels below Farthen Dûr, and being the helpful person she was, she volunteered along with Murtagh. The two of them had spoken more often with each other once their mutual friend awoke from his state of unconscious recovery, and the sailor understood his reasons.

Having finished her weapons exercises, she stood straight once she saw Solembum sprinting to her in his four-legged form. In the intervals when Angela was urgently called to the healing wards soon after the battle, the werecat and the girl spent a lot more time together than usual.

"Yes, Master Cat?" Sometimes he wondered how she managed to stay insufferably polite in every state of appearance and exhaustion. The girl's usually smooth black curls were horribly tangled, and her sun-bronzed skin was smeared with dirt. Her clothes were a far cry from the garments she had donned just the earlier morning; Angela would have scolded her had she seen the damage.

Ajihad and the raiding party have just returned, he told her. If you want to make the next roster, you better hurry. With a muttered curse in Gaelic, Jesse ran off to wash and don her armor. It was bad enough that most of the people except for Ajihad himself objected to her even being there. If she were late or unprepared, they would consider their worries justified.Sometimes she really hated the narrow-minded views of the human society here. Girls were a lot more useful than boys most of the time.

After quickly changing her clothes and untangling her hair before putting it up in a ponytail, the sailor strapped on the armor that she wore on the Battle of Farthen Dûr. Once more she attached and hid dozens of blades onto her person, and dashed out again the moment she was done.

Like the dwarves, the girl avoided the hallway where the ruins of Isidar Mithrim on her way to the tunnels. Murtagh seemed to have gotten the news at the same time she did, and was racing towards the meeting spot from somewhere else. Seeing him in the distance, Jesse felt a little bit competitive.

Though sailors seldom have the chance to run free on land, they tended to savor it greatly once they got the chance. The girl lengthened her stride, not even bothering to increase her speed until he noticed her. Once he did, they thundered down to the tunnel entry on time and (for one of the racers) out of breath.

"Ho, now!" the dark-skinned leader laughed, "Save your energy for the hunt. I guarantee that you will expend all of it before we even start the walk back." Both youngsters nodded and behaved themselves.

And wasn't long after they entered the underground that Jesse felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. She paid close attention to her surroundings this time; the last time it happened, an Urgal had been sneaking up on her and would've cleaved off her head had she not turned around and ducked.

Seeing her tense up, Murtagh whispered, "What's wrong?" When the young sailor did not answer, he anxiously looked all around him, though it wasn't much of an attempt since all he could see was black.

Suddenly, Jesse ran forward and took a torch from an unsuspecting soldier beside her. Despite his yells, she was just in time to chuck it in the face of an Urgal that was about to attack at the front of the group. The Kull bellowed in pain, and the girl climbed on hurriedly and slit his throat. She jumped down quickly as the body fell with a thud.

Jesse saw everyone of her critics looking at her with unabashed shock, none the least of whom were the Twins. She shrugged at their expressions, and hefted the slick blade up to check for cracks before wiping it clean on the Urgal.

"Always trust your inner twitches in a place you don't know," the young sailor told them as she went back in line. It was some moments before Ajihad gave the order to move forward.

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Jesse collapsed with relief on the pallet. It had been her farthest hunt in the tunnels of Farthen Dûr to date, and had recently sustained a gash on her shoulder where a Kull tried to disembowel her.

Unwilling to let the wound get infected, the girl suffered to get up again and peel off her shirt to properly see it. Hissing at the look of it, she got a bit of Angela's ointment from the shelf and slathered it on slowly. Ignoring the pain, the young sailor also found bandages and tried to bind it herself.

Two small hands gently took it away and bound the wound properly, and Jesse thanked Solembum as he shifted once more into a cat. She managed to find another change of clothes and get a bath in before rushing off to find Eragon, who she hadn't seen in days.

As expected, his whereabouts were indicated by the presence of Saphira, who nudged her with her snout in greeting. Jesse smiled, then looked at where the Rider was busy talking to Arya.

The young sailor knew the face of a love-struck man when she saw one, and boy did he look the part. He probably did not realize it, but his not-so-subtle looks in her direction were painfully obvious. In any case, the elf was very comely, but he might find it a bit awkward to find that the object of his affections was a lot older than himself.

Jesse saw the recent party emerging from the tunnels, their distinctive leader in the forefront. She smiled and waved to Ajihad and Murtagh, though only the boy waved back.

A  commotion suddenly sounded behind them, and the girl was horrified at the sight of Kull ambushing the force. Forgetting that she had but five knives on her, the young sailor ran madly for the skirmish, jumping over the trench that bridged between them. Immediately whipping out her longest blades, she put her back to one of Ajihad's guards and helped him protect their precious leader in the center.

But it was all in vain. Soon enough, the man was struck down by an Urgal battle-axe and Jesse was desperately trying not to get hurt worse than she already was. Various more scratches had been added to her gallery, and it took her more and more time to sneak behind an enemy and kill him quickly.

She sighed in relief when Eragon, Saphira, and Arya came to the rescue. Thinking, I have to get out of here before I'm a liability, she turned around to trudge back to Angela's loft. The girl bit back a scream of anguish as she saw the dark-haired Varden leader lying on top of the bodies of five Urgals.

Jesse scrambled to his side, trying to stop the flood of red that escaped him. He stopped her efforts gently, and shook his head. Tears marked their tracks down her face. He was dying.

It was like losing her family all over again.