Hedarth was a busy city, especially considering how isolated it was, being on the other side of the Hadarac desert to the empire. It was a primarily dwarven outpost, once used for trade with the elves, but now it was used as a travel stop for people either arriving or leaving Alageasia. Ragin had never personally been to the city, as it was so far away from the Empire, and not many targets bothered to travel out so far. Besides, most of his jobs were primarily human targeted. Not many humans, rich humans that is, lived so far from the capitol.

The dragon riders had landed on the outskirts of the city, far away from the crowded streets of eager travellers. That didn't stop them from being noticed however, and it wasn't long before hundreds of curious people had made their way over to the riders. Most simply watched, trying to get a glimpse of the amazing creatures that were dragons. Others were a bit bolder and approached them, asking questions of interest.

Akaysha was a bit nervous of the crowd. She had never been around so many people before and Ragin could feel her constantly fidgeting, shuffling her wings, moving her tail, scratching the ground with her claws. All her life she had been hiding from the world, and here she was now, more visible than any of the dragons around her. Greens, blues, browns and yellows were rather common colours amongst dragons, but her starry midnight scales were quite the attention grabber. Ragin kept people from coming too close with a glare that would stop a heart.

"So you don't like people," stated Freya with a slight grin as she looked down at the thief laying against Akaysha's side.

"Not especially. I can be quite charming when I want to but in general not many people are smart enough to be honoured with my voice," Ragin replied so seriously it was obvious he was joking.

"Unless you are tricking them into allowing you to rob them?" she raised her eyebrow.

"I think you are finally beginning to understand me," he said.

He had a rather strange relationship with Freya. They had begun to talk far more often since their first quip five days ago. It was an interesting experience for Ragin, considering he had known her for a while now but had never really seen her personally. Usually he stayed quite far away from anyone he had gone to effort to get information on, but now he was finally able to get to know the person. At times it was a little awkward, as she would let slip information he already knew and he was forced to pretend he didn't.

"Well what would you usually be doing in a crowd like this?" she asked.

"Following someone, most likely. You would be surprising how easy it is to slip a hand into someone's pocket when there are hundreds of people just milling around," he said.

"I don't doubt it. But most people at least have the honour not to."

"Most people are idiots. I don't see your point," he shrugged.

"You know, with an attitude like that you won't get many friends."

"That is true, but the friends I do get will be far closer than what most people experience with 'friends'."

"Aargh... you are impossible."

As they day went on the crowd dwindled until Ragin could once again think clearly. While he was more used to crowds than Akaysha was, he was usually in the midst of one, not the attention of one. Usually, during his outings, the larger the crowd the better. It meant less people were at home, and it was so much harder to pick out an individual amongst a crowd.

'Well, that was an interesting experience,' said Akaysha as the sun began to set in the horizon.

'Yes. How are you feeling?' he asked as he piled a number of logs of wood onto their fire.

'Uncomfortable.'

'You know, you are a weird dragon.'

'What makes you say that?'

'Well, typically your kind loves attention.'

'Since when?'

'Since your wings first graced the sky. People saw you as beautiful, and you wholeheartedly excepted it.'

'Beautiful maybe, doesn't mean everybody should stare at us all day long. I feel like an art piece.'

'Well, to be fair, you would make a pretty amazing art piece.'

'That's not what this is about Ragin,' Akaysha snorted at him.

"Aah, you just need to learn to accept when people appreciate you," he said out loud, brushing off his hands, "Now, I'm going to go for a little explore around this place. Haven't been here before so I ain't missing the opportunity, considering I'm going to be stuck in New Doru Araeba for possibly the rest of my life."

The dragoness tilted her head at him, 'I seriously doubt that. But have fun either way. And don't get into trouble.'

"I'll try my best not to," he said with a smirk.

"And what makes you think I'll be allowing you to go off on your own?" Arya said as he went to leave.

The elf was sitting on Firnen's foreleg, holding what looked to be a mirror. It confused Ragin for a moment, as he did not take her to be someone who was overly worried about appearance, but he quickly realised that it wasn't the mirror's purpose. She had been talking to someone. He assumed it was probably Eragon, but if not some other rider.

"You seriously don't trust me enough to be able to head out? I swore an oath in the ancient language to follow you to New Doru Araeba, and there is no way I'm getting out of that," he said, "And it's not like I'm going to do anything out of the ordinary. I just want to... have a look around."

"Ragin, you have a reputation as a thief, how do I know you won't try anything shady when you are gone," she replied.

"I won't steal or rob anything from anyone while we are in this city," he said in the ancient language, and then switched back to English, "There, now can I go? Or do I have to beg?"

"As amusing as that might be, I guess it wouldn't hurt to allow you some time away from us. But don't break this small amount of trust I'm giving you," she warned.

"I wouldn't think of it," he smirked, before turning around and stalking out of the camp before anyone could change their mind.

He had his sword at his side, the riders had allowed him to keep it at his insistence, and a dark cloak wrapped around his shoulders. He whipped the hood over his head so he would remain anonymous to most people, and walked into the streets.

The place seemed even more crowded from the ground. There were people absolutely everywhere. Every street seemed absolutely full. Every inn he saw had a sign out the front saying 'no rooms left'. Bars were full to the brim with loud and noisy chattering, accompanied by the overwhelming stench of alcohol. Ragin wrinkled his nose, while he wasn't against haven't the occasional drink every now and then, he hated the smell when it was everywhere.

There were many different types of people within the streets. He spotted humans, dwarves, elves, the occasional urgal. He spotted one of the serpentine, a race that had scales for skin and snake like eyes, pushing his way through the crowd. A bunch of dwarven children rushed past him, laughing delightedly and not seeming at all concerned with the massive crowd. A rather elegant looking elf stood to one side with her nose turned up in open disgust at the scenery around her, though no one seemed to really notice or care.

Market stalls were lined along the main street of the city, most of the vendors being dwarves. They sold everything, from food, to cloth and linens, to trinkets and jewellery. Ragin found himself drawn to neat looking stall lined with daggers, throwing disks and short swords. While he doubted they were of the best quality, it was rather hard to find a place that sold so many of an assassin's favoured weapons.

He ended up purchasing a rather showy dagger with a curved blade and a ruby implanted hilt. It was definitely an overpriced piece of garbage, the steal not being at all well made and the weapon itself feeling a slight bit unbalanced in his hand, but he didn't really care. It looked cool and he wasn't overly fussy about his coin. Besides, the ruby in the hilt would be a useful place to store some of his energy.

Next he picked up some food. A sausage cooked on a stick, a 'delicacy' in these parts. He scoffed it down in a couple of bites and threw the stick onto the ground. The cobblestone pathway was already littered with pretty much everything. If someone happened to skewer their foot on the stick, it would help bring attention to how messy the place really was.

Ragin spent the next couple of hours wondering through the city, looking at different stalls, gleaning information from people's minds, and occasionally stopping to chat with someone that seemed mildly interesting. He ended up purchasing a couple of other items as well. A jewelled ring, again overpriced but a useful place to store energy, a necklace that he would enchant later, and a small draconic statue that reminded him somewhat of Akaysha, though she disagreed when he told her about it.

As he wondered back to the camp he felt the sudden urge to get a higher up view of the city. He slipped into one of the less popular alleyways, the type of place where more questionable things tended to happen. More illegal things. He scaled the wall of what he guessed to be some sort of brothel, ignoring the looks that were cast toward him as he did. He pulled himself onto the flat roof above and sighed deeply, a little relieved to be free of the clutter of the crowd.

He walked to the edge and looked out over the streets below with a slight grin. He was on one of the taller buildings so was easily able to scape out the area. Most buildings were of a rectangular design and made from either clay, stone or bricks. There was a dock to the far side, where ships were docked from long voyagers. Ragin knew that the river lead all the way to where New Doru Araeba now stood, though he knew it would be a bit harder to get to then simply following a river.

He stood by the edge of the roof, watching the commotion below for a couple of minutes, before a slight grunt behind him gave him a surprise. He spun around to see a dark figure, with a similar black hooded cape to his, pulling himself onto the roof. Ragin frowned and hesitated. The hesitation nearly cost him his life.

The figure produced a sharp dagger from inside his robe, and without warning leapt toward the startled rider. Ragin let out a cry of surprise, jumping to the side and grabbing the figure's right wrist, where the dagger was held, and warding it away. The assassin reacted with inhuman speed, swiping the dagger toward Ragin's face, missing the flailing victim by inches.

A familiar sweet smelling tinge followed the blade's path. It was poisoned. Ragin's eyes widened in alarm as he leapt backwards and out of reach. While his wards should protect him against his assailants attacks, he wasn't willing to risk magic while his opponent was so shadowy and unknown. He went to draw his sword but the figure didn't even give him a chance. The moment he reached to draw it the figure struck again, forcing Ragin to block the dagger hand again. Whoever this person was, he was insanely quick, and strong.

"Who are you?" Ragin growled between his teeth.

The assassin didn't answer, and simply stared at the rider from underneath his hood, the dagger clutched in his hand, ready to strike. Ragin narrowed his eyes and focused his mind into a single mental beam and shoved it at his a opponent. Whoever it was hesitated a moment, startled by the sudden attack. That was all Ragin needed. He used his distraction to pull his sword from the sheath and stabbed toward the man. The assassin grunted and swung his blade sideways, blocking the sword, but loosing concentration on the mental battle at hand.

Ragin felt a give in the assassin's mind as he broke through. The information he got was rather startling. His assailant was an elf named Tenel, rather young compared to most other elves at fifty six years of age. He had become an assassin for hire six years prior, avoiding both the Black Hand and the Dragon Riders. While overwhelmingly successful, he didn't have much training, usually relying on his superior elven strengths to take down his opponents. Unfortunately for him, Ragin had gone up against far more skilled opponents.

He also quickly learned that the elf had been hired by none other than Mr. Foeswarn, and had taken an oath in the ancient language to see Ragin dead, no matter the cost. It seemed that Foeswarn had been keeping an eye out for a dark dragon and her rider, and at the first instance of a sighting had sent out his hunters for Ragin. Tenel was only one of many.

Gritting his teeth Ragin stepped forward, having gained full control of his opponent, and stabbed his blade right through Tenel's heart. The elf let out a grunt of surprise, his dagger clattering to the floor as he slumped forward, his eyes wide. Some deep part of Ragin winced slightly at the death, but he ignored it. If he didn't kill Tenel now, he would only be forced to do it later.

"Foeswarn... will... get you," Tenel grunted as his life drained from his body, his voice surprisingly melodic for an assassin, "There is... nowhere... you can hide."

"We'll see about that," Ragin replied sternly, before he pulled his blade out from Tenel's chest and let the body fall to the floor.

After a small hesitation, he picked up the poisoned dagger and slipped it into a sheath in his cloak, before opening his mind once again to his surroundings. Almost instantly his mind was full of the thoughts of a worrying dragon.

'Ragin! Are you alright? What happened?' Akaysha yelled in his head.

'I was attacked. Don't worry, I wasn't injured. It's over now. I'm coming back. Tell Arya I need to have a chat,' he said, climbing back down the wall and quickly making his way into a more crowded section again, 'It seems coming into the open may have put us in more danger than we realized.'

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Hey guys! New chapter, I hope you enjoyed. Vote if you did and comment what you thought of it. The next chapter will be out as soon as I can get it. See Ya!

Pennator^^