Disclaimer: Not mine. If you thought so, you are sorely mistaken. The Inheritance Cycle and everything in it belongs to George Lucas--oops! I mean Christopher Paolini.

Summary: Two boys, two dragons. Brothers in blood, because it was worth being yelled at by Oromis to make them real brothers. Oneshot.

Two

From the beginning, they are polar opposites, and of course, instantly become best of friends.

Two ten-year-old boys--transported to a completely alien environment surrounded by a half-dozen others, both male and female.

The taller boy steps out of the wagon first, stretching. The small one follows in his footsteps.

One goes first, and the other follows.

The short boy spits on the ground. He steps in it and grinds it to mud beneath one bare heel.

Some of the other children stare or laugh nervously, but the tall boy asks, "Whatcha doing?"

"Spitting."

"What for?"

"Luck."

The tall kid grins and spits too. He steps in the spit and churns it to mud under his foot, also bare.

"Damn if someone's gonna be luckier than me," the boy says, stomping his dirty foot on the ground.

The short boy responds to the challenge and spits again.

So does the tall one.

By the time the gates open and the fey woman leads them through into Ilirea, they spit themselves dry.

After a brief argument over who had accumulated the most luck, the short boy smiles and says, "I'm Brom Holcombsson. Who're you?"

"I'm Morzan. I don't have a father."

Either because of the spitting or just by coincidence, both boys hatch a dragon on their first try.

"See," Brom says to a girl who'd laughed at him. "It works."

The dragon in his arms laughs. The one in Morzan's does too.

Two dragons, two boys. Laughter.

But not for long.

Two brothers, bonded by blood.

(Oromis yelled at them for getting blood on the floor, but it was worth doing it, just so they'd be brothers for real.)

An argument.

A rebellion begins.

"We have to do something about it," Morzan hisses. "Damn old elf, making us bow and call him Master and shave--just 'cause he's jealous he can't grow a beard himself, I bet! Stinking godless heathens, won't let us sacrifice anything or pray--d'you know what they did to Arren last week? And they always glare at us, say stuff about humans when they think we can't hear."

They are in the library, whispering fiercely in a corner.

"You're just paranoid."

"Just 'cause I'm paranoid don't mean they're not all out to get me," Morzan says grumpily. "But I'm being serious. And they won't let us have any meat, either. I'm sick of rabbit food, godsdammit!"

"Ebrithil Oromis says he won't stop us from hunting, and it's our choice--"

"But he does stop us! I was trying to go out, to get some decent food for once, and he stopped me. Gave me a load of paperwork to do!" Morzan says, angry. "You just can't see how the elves treat us; you're too busy bowing and scraping and licking their shoes, their stupid cloth shoes that wouldn't last a day in the real world--"

"You're too busy sneaking into the faelnirv stores to see the truth!" Brom's voice is becoming dangerously loud. Morzan motions for him to keep quiet. "The elves never treat me--or anyone else--badly. You're just imagining it."

Morzan looks offended. "The faelnirv incident was completely exaggerated!"

They bicker in the library until night falls. In the end, Morzan and Brom reach a truce and go to dinner. Morzan stabs sulkily at a plate of steamed vegetables, mumbling about rabbit food.

That night word reaches them of one of the older students, who inexplicably leaves Ilirea.

He is flying north.

The student returns much later, minus his dragon and most of his sanity.

With much persuasion from Morzan, the two go down to the dungeons where the mad student is being kept.

"Cardock?" Brom asks timidly in the darkness. "You okay?"

There is a moan. A whimper.

Morzan takes a torch from the wall and pokes it through the cell bars. "Cardock? You in there?"

It's Cardock, but almost unrecognizable. Emanciated with starvation, purple-eyed with exhaustion, and...

"My gods," whispers Brom. "Are those whip marks?"

Red lines trace patterns all over him, on his face and chest as well as his back. His skin is lacerated in a thousand places. This is far from the student they look up to, who they admire (secretly). He speaks.

"I'm mad, they say, they say I'm mad but I'm not, I never did anything to them, so why? Why?" His breath is shallow and weak. "They say, 'Take him away, whip him, whip him.' But I don't understand, it's dark and cold and where is my dragon? Where is she?"

Without warning, he screams his dragon's name, and the sound is terrifying in the darkness of the dungeon.

Both Brom and Morzan recoil with horror from the sight of this battered shadow and give thanks (secretly) for still having their dragons. But in the end the mad student subsides into a fit of ragged, painful coughing. There is enough light to see blood fly out of his mouth.

"We should leave," whispers Brom. his eyes are wide with fright. "We'll get in trouble. He's mad. We shouldn't even be talking to him."

"No," Morzan says. "He's injured. If I... If I lost my dragon, I'd be in the same state. You'd still take care of me, wouldn't you?"

Brom bites his lip. "If it were you. This isn't you. We hardly know Cardock."

The student is still babbling.

"...they won't let me try. I hate them. I hate them! They can't, they can't, they can't, they won't! Silver tongues tell truth but not, lies, all lies..."

"Pretend," Morzan says shortly. "Now keep an eye out. I'm opening the door. If anyone comes, tell me."

He takes a set of lock picks from his pocket. Last week they learned about warding locks to resist magical interference, and Morzan doesn't want either of them to get in trouble.

In minutes the door is open and the lock picks are back in Morzan's robes. Brom tugs his sleeve. "Be careful," he warns.

"I'm not worried," Morzan says. "He seems harmless. Mad all the same, though."

For luck, he knocks three times on the doorframe.

"Cardock?"

"Not Cardock anymore," he says, panting faintly. "Not Cardock. Fake name. Not mine. Never, never. My name is--" And he says something unintelligible.

"What'd he say? Gaggo-what-ix?"

More clearly, the injured man says, "Galbatorix," but Morzan does not see it as much of an improvement.

Brom makes a face. "Old Humani for 'great king'. He's lost his mind, alright."

"Don't make no difference to me. Cardock, or whatever you call yourself, sit tight. I'll fix you up."

Two words in the darkness.

"Waise heill."

A red glow. The warmth of friendship. Two boys-no-longer-boys, and a wounded shadow in a cell.

War on the horizon.

The new dragon's name is Shruikan.

The old Riders will soon be destroyed, and the scourge (the disease, the infection, the blight) of the elves removed from Alagaesia. Their lies will never again twist the mind of a gullible ten-year-old who spits and knocks on doorframes for luck.

That's what Morzan thinks, and he walks out of his brother's life without turning back.

One man.

One dragon.

One. Alone.

"We don't need him anyways," Brom says, locking his arms around her neck. "We'll do fine on our own. Just you and me, Saphira."

One unspoken word.

One unasked question.

'Why?'

A city on an island. The Rider's capital.

On Vroengard it is raining, but Doru Araeba is burning.

A dragon, flying. Another, moving to intercept.

A movement.

A reflex.

A kill.

Shouting.

"Why didn't you put her armor on, you idiot?" But his enemy--

(blood-brother, best friend, Brom)

--is falling, falling with the body of his dying dragon, unconscious already and there's nothing he can do, he will be dead in moments, he has to keep fighting or he will be killed--

Saphira's body hits the ground.

Morzan's heart stops

breaks

dies

but keeps beating anyways.

Gil'ead.

He is seeing ghosts, Morzan decides. He's already half-dead anyways; his heart died when Brom did.

So it's not all that surprising when Brom reappears, aged, bearded, but still shorter than him.

Some things will never change.

Some things will.

Morzan was always a better swordsman than Brom.

A key word: was.

There's a sword in his chest but it doesn't matter;

he's been dead for nearly a hundred years

(his heart died with Brom in the rain)

and his vision is going blurry

but as he falls, dying,

he spits and grins

for luck.

Author's Note: I'm fairly pleased with this. It's very short and probably full of errors, but I kind of liked it. Of course, my brother said it was too "melodramatic", which I suppose translates to "angsty". I was trying to go for a "The Book Thief"-type effect (story of the Holocaust, told by Death, who sorely needs a vacation; very original, very good) which somehow had me laughing my head off and sobbing my guts out simultaneously with a weird but well-done Humor/Angst genre. Okay, I know you will be doing neither because I'm no Markus Zusak, but I hope it's not too angsty, you know? If I wanted angst I would... I dunno. Write about Morzan contemplating suicide? Or Brom? Or Anakin? Or Obi-Wan? (If you haven't yet noticed the huge relations between Star Wars and Inheritance, um... actually, I didn't notice 'til someone told me. Go figure. Oblivious me.)

So, ah... Sort of meant to be but not really angsty. I hope. Also (sadly) very short. Sigh.

Please tell me what you thought of it!