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"Dero, hey!"

I glanced around the crowded market place to find Eragon, a childhood friend, pushing his way through the throng of people. I smiled and waved him over.

"Hey," I replied. "What's new?"

Eragon shrugged and motioned to his bow. "It's defective." Must have been an unsuccessful morning.

"Suure it is." I smiled and before I knew it his fist connected rather painfully with my arm. "Ow!"

He laughed, a free, un-concerned laugh. I tried to shoot him a dark, meaningful look, but it came out more like the face someone makes when they smell something aweful. This did nothing to help stop Eragon's laughter.

"What was that?" he asked between gasping breaths.

I ignored the question. "You know it's rude to hit a girl."

"Pfff."

Alright I admit it, I laughed a little. Through all the trying to be serious, I couldn't help it. It was contagious! I groaned in defeat and plopped down on a low-standing bale of hay. It was quiet between us for a moment. Surrounded by the haggling chatter of the marketplace, neither of us felt the need to speak. Somewhere in the distance, three children started squealing about a game of tag. I smiled and looked down to me feet, only then noticing the bag that was slung over Eragon's shoulder.

"Looks like your morning wasn't completely lost," I commented, looking up to him. "What's in the sack?"

His hand tightened around the bag's strap. "I guess....It's nothing. " Eragon's body turned away from me to put his body between mine and the bag. It could have been involuntary....

I raised an eyebrow at him and we kept eye contact for a moment. I shrugged. "Whatever you say." I looked away nonchalantly but I couldn't help glancing back at the bag out of the corner of my eye. I can't explain it in perfect words, but I almost knew what it was. Not exactly, no, but I knew that I somehow had a connection to it. I closed my eyes, trying to drink in the feeling of my connection to this....thing. I liked it.

Thump, thump, thump...

My eyes shot open and my head wipped around. I unabashedly stared at the sack, my mouth hanging slightly open, my eyes wide. A heartbeat! "Eragon!" I hissed. "Eragon, let me see it."

Eragon looked frightened suddenly and pushed the sack further away from me with his hand. "N-no."

"Eragon...."

"N-no Dero. I mean...." he heasitated. "It's just a few mushrooms. Um.... I'll see yo tomorrow."

And with that, he left for his uncle Garrow's.

--------------

I sat on a low-lying tree stump, my elbows resting on the log behind me. It was dusk, the stars just beginning to emerge from their resting places in the sky. A single candle rested on the soft ground as my only means of finding my way back home from the meadow. The meadow was a place of solitude for me; a place to think. It was quiet, though, for the nightengales did not sing. The mice did not scurry. The crickets did not chirp. It would rain soon, which would give the villagers more peace of mind in the time of war. I chuckled. When did I start caring about the villagers?

It was funny, what they thought of me. They were frightened of me, though I'd never understood why. Like I was a witch that can tell you the future, most of them didn't know whether or not to ask how they'd die. And yet they speak to me. Perhaps only the minimal amount of conversation required, such as a 'Hello' or 'I hope your brother is well,' but it was something. I suppose they were only being polite, but I wished they wouldn't be. I wished they would speak to me as they would speak to eachother, and to show genuine concern for my welll-being, but people are frightened of things they don't understand. They are frightened of shadows.

But completely spereate, it seemed, were the cousins Eragon and Roran. They were different. They weren't afraid of getting close to me like the rest of them. They didn't need to be polite. They would laugh and joke with me, share their concerns with me as I would share mine with them, and they'd always been nice to my brother, even though Nicolai was far younger than the both of them. They were just....nice.

Thunder started to roll, echoing from beyond the mountains of the Spine and leaving an eerie, chilling wind behind it. When the rain began to fall, I lifted me face to the sky, waiting to feel the cool, wet splashes. My eyes closed....

Nothing. Not one drop hit me. Not my hands, not my arms, nor my feet or my face. Nothing. And yet, if I swiped my hand along the grass, it felt wet. I could hear the rain, could smell it. I opened my eyes and immediately wished I hadn't. A numbness began swimming through my fingertips, leaving the feeling of a thousand hornet stings in its wake. I lunged away from where I was sitting, trying desparately to get away from the pain. My throat closed and I found myself unable to breathe, unable to scream. The last thing i saw was a thousand little black dots blinking in an out whenever a raindrop got too close to me.