And in the center of the foam, he thought he could discern, just barely, three broken masts and a black sail floating round and round and round in an endless circle. But it might have been his imagination.
Leastways, that’s what he told himself.
Elain came up beside him, one hand resting on her swollen belly. In a small voice, she said, “We were lucky, Roran, more lucky than we had reason to expect.”
“Aye,” he agreed.
TO ABERON
Underneath Saphira, the pathless forest stretched wide to each white horizon, fading as it did from the deepest green to a hazy, washed-out purple. Martins, rooks, and other woodland birds flitted above the gnarled pines, uttering shrieks of alarm when they beheld Saphira. She flew low to the canopy in order to protect her two passengers from the arctic temperatures in the upper reaches of the sky.
Except for when Saphira fled the Ra’zac into the Spine, this was the first time she and Eragon had had the opportunity to fly together over a great stretch of distance without having to stop or hold back for companions on the ground. Saphira was especially pleased with the trip, and she delighted in showing Eragon how Glaedr’s tutelage had enhanced her strength and endurance.
After his initial discomfort abated, Orik said to Eragon, “I doubt I could ever be comfortable in the air, but I can understand why you and Saphira enjoy it so. Flying makes you feel free and unfettered, like a fierce-eyed hawk hunting his prey! It sets my heart a-pounding, it does.”
To reduce the tedium of the journey, Orik played a game of riddles with Saphira. Eragon excused himself from the contest as he had never been particularly adept at riddles; the twist of thought necessary to solve them always seemed to escape him. In this, Saphira far exceeded him. As most dragons are, she was fascinated by puzzles and found them quite easy to unravel.
Orik said, “The only riddles I know are in Dwarvish. I will do mine best to translate them, but the results may be rough and unwieldy.” Then he asked:
Tall I am young.
Short I am old.
While with life I do glow,
Urûr’s breath is my foe.
Not fair, growled Saphira. I know little of your gods. Eragon had no need to repeat her words, for Orik had granted permission for her to project them directly into his mind.
Orik laughed. “Do you give up?”
Never. For a few minutes, the only sound was the sweep of her wings, until she asked, Is it a candle?
“Right you are.”
A puff of hot smoke floated back into Orik’s and Eragon’s faces as she snorted. I do poorly with such riddles. I’ve not been inside a house since the day I hatched, and I find enigmas difficult that deal with domestic subjects. Next she offered:
What herb cures all ailments?
This proved a terrible poser for Orik. He grumbled and groaned and gnashed his teeth in frustration. Behind him, Eragon could not help but grin, for he saw the answer plain in Saphira’s mind. Finally, Orik said, “Well, what is it? You have bested me with this.”
By the black raven’s crime, and by this rhyme, the answer would be thyme.
Now it was Orik’s turn to cry, “Not fair! This is not mine native tongue. You cannot expect me to grasp such wordplay!”
Fair is fair. It was a proper riddle.
Eragon watched the muscles at the back of Orik’s neck bunch and knot as the dwarf jutted his head forward. “If that is your stance, O Irontooth, then I’d have you solve this riddle that every dwarf child knows.”
I am named Morgothal’s Forge and Helzvog’s Womb.
I veil Nordvig’s Daughter and bring gray death,
And make the world anew with Helzvog’s Blood.
What be I?
And so they went, exchanging riddles of increasing difficulty while Du Weldenvarden sped past below. Gaps in the thatched branches often revealed patches of silver, sections of the many rivers that threaded the forest. Around Saphira, the clouds billowed in a fantastic architecture: vaulting arches, domes, and columns; crenelated ramparts; towers the size of mountains; and ridges and valleys suffused with a glowing light that made Eragon feel as if they flew through a dream.
So fast was Saphira that, when dusk arrived, they had already left Du Weldenvarden behind and entered the auburn fields that separated the great forest from the Hadarac Desert. They made their camp among the grass and hunkered round their small fire, utterly alone upon the flat face of the earth. They were grim-faced and said little, for words only emphasized their insignificance in that bare and empty land.
Eragon took advantage of their stop to store some of his energy in the ruby that adorned Zar’roc’s pommel. The gem absorbed all the power he gave it, as well as Saphira’s when she lent her strength. It would, concluded Eragon, be a number of days before they could saturate both the ruby and the twelve diamonds concealed within the belt of Beloth the Wise.
Weary from the exercise, he wrapped himself in blankets, lay beside Saphira, and drifted into his waking sleep, where his night phantasms played out against the sea of stars above.
Soon after they resumed their journey the following morning, the rippling grass gave way to tan scrub, which grew ever more scarce until, in turn, it was replaced by sunbaked ground bare of all but the most hardy plants. Reddish gold dunes appeared. From his vantage on Saphira, they looked to Eragon like lines of waves forever sailing toward a distant shore.
As the sun began its descent, he noticed a cluster of mountains in the distant east and knew he beheld Du Fells Nángoröth, where the wild dragons had gone to mate, to raise their young, and eventually to die. We must visit there someday, said Saphira, following his gaze.
Aye.
That night, Eragon felt their solitude even more keenly than before, for they were camped in the emptiest region of the Hadarac Desert, where so little moisture existed in the air that his lips soon cracked, though he smeared them with nalgask every few minutes. He sensed little life in the ground, only a handful of miserable plants interspersed with a few insects and lizards.
As he had when they fled Gil’ead through the desert, Eragon drew water from the soil to replenish their waterskins, and before he allowed the water to drain away, he scryed Nasuada in the pool’s reflection to see if the Varden had been attacked yet. To his relief, they had not.
On the third day since leaving Ellesméra, the wind rose up behind them and wafted Saphira farther than she could have flown on her own, carrying them entirely out of the Hadarac Desert.
Near the edge of the waste, they passed over a number of horse-mounted nomads who were garbed in flowing robes to ward against the heat. The men shouted in their rough tongue and shook their swords and spears at Saphira, though none of them dared loose an arrow at her.
Eragon, Saphira, and Orik bivouacked for the night at the southernmost end of Silverwood Forest, which lay along Lake Tüdosten and was named so because it was composed almost entirely of beeches, willows, and trembling poplars. In contrast to the endless twilight that lay beneath the brooding pines of Du Weldenvarden, Silverwood was filled with bright sunshine, larks, and the gentle rustling of green leaves. The trees seemed young and happy to Eragon, and he was glad to be there. And though all signs of the desert had vanished, the weather remained far warmer than he was accustomed to at that time of year. It felt more like summer than spring.
From there they flew straight to Aberon, the capital of Surda, guided by directions Eragon gleaned from the memories of birds they encountered. Saphira made no attempt to conceal herself along the way, and they often heard cries of amazement and alarm from the villages she swept over.
It was late afternoon when they arrived at Aberon, a low, walled city centered around a bluff in an otherwise flat landscape. Borromeo Castle occupied the top of the bluff. The rambling citadel was protected by three concentric layers of walls, numerous towers, and, Eragon noted, hundreds of ballistae made for shooting down a dragon. The rich amber light from the low sun cast Aberon’s buildings in sharp r
elief and illuminated a plume of dust rising from the city’s western gate, where a line of soldiers sought entrance.
As Saphira descended toward the inner ward of the castle, she brought Eragon into contact with the combined thoughts of the people in the capital. The noise overwhelmed him at first—how was he supposed to listen for foes and still function at the same time?—until he realized that, as usual, he was concentrating too much on specifics. All he had to do was sense people’s general intentions. He broadened his focus, and the individual voices clamoring for his attention subsided into a continuum of the emotions surrounding him. It was like a sheet of water that lay draped over the nearby landscape, undulating with the rise and fall of people’s feelings and spiking whenever someone was racked by extremes of passion.
Thus, Eragon was aware of the alarm that gripped the people below as word of Saphira spread. Careful, he told her. We don’t want them to attack us.
Dirt billowed into the air with each beat of Saphira’s powerful wings as she settled in the middle of the courtyard, sinking her claws into the bare ground to steady herself. The horses tethered in the yard neighed with fear, creating such an uproar that Eragon finally inserted himself in their minds and calmed them with words from the ancient language.
Eragon dismounted after Orik, eyeing the many soldiers that lined the parapets and the drawn ballistae they manned. He did not fear the weapons, but he had no desire to become engaged in a fight with his allies.
A group of twelve men, some soldiers, hurried out of the keep toward Saphira. They were led by a tall man with the same dark skin as Nasuada, only the third person Eragon had met with such a complexion. Halting ten paces away, the man bowed—as did his followers—then said, “Welcome, Rider. I am Dahwar, son of Kedar. I am King Orrin’s seneschal.”
Eragon inclined his head. “And I, Eragon Shadeslayer, son of none.”
“And I, Orik, Thrifk’s son.”
And I, Saphira, daughter of Vervada, said Saphira, using Eragon as her mouthpiece.
Dahwar bowed again. “I apologize that no one of higher rank than myself is present to greet guests as noble as you, but King Orrin, Lady Nasuada, and all the Varden have long since marched to confront Galbatorix’s army.” Eragon nodded. He had expected as much. “They left orders that if you came here seeking them, you should join them directly, for your prowess is needed if we are to prevail.”
“Can you show us on a map how to find them?” asked Eragon.
“Of course, sir. While I have that fetched, would you care to step out of the heat and partake of some refreshments?”
Eragon shook his head. “We have no time to waste. Besides, it is not I who needs to see the map but Saphira, and I doubt she would fit in your halls.”
That seemed to catch the seneschal off guard. He blinked and ran his eyes over Saphira, then said, “Quite right, sir. In either case, our hospitality is yours. If there is aught you and your companions desire, you have but to ask.”
For the first time, Eragon realized that he could issue commands and expect them to be followed. “We need a week’s worth of provisions. For me, only fruit, vegetables, flour, cheese, bread—things like that. We also need our waterskins refilled.” He was impressed that Dahwar did not question his avoidance of meat. Orik added his requests then for jerky, bacon, and other such products.
Snapping his fingers, Dahwar sent two servants running back into the keep to collect the supplies. While everyone in the ward waited for the men to return, he asked, “May I assume by your presence here, Shadeslayer, that you completed your training with the elves?”
“My training shall never end so long as I’m alive.”
“I see.” Then, after a moment, Dahwar said, “Please excuse my impertinence, sir, for I am ignorant of the ways of the Riders, but are you not human? I was told you were.”
“That he is,” growled Orik. “He was…changed. And you should be glad he was, or our predicament would be far worse than it is.” Dahwar was tactful enough not to pursue the subject, but from his thoughts Eragon concluded that the seneschal would have paid a handsome price for further details—any information about Eragon or Saphira was valuable in Orrin’s government.
The food, water, and map were soon brought by two wide-eyed pages. At Eragon’s word, they deposited the items beside Saphira, looking terribly frightened as they did, then retreated behind Dahwar. Kneeling on the ground, Dahwar unrolled the map—which depicted Surda and the neighboring lands—and drew a line northwest from Aberon to Cithrí. He said, “Last I heard, King Orrin and Lady Nasuada stopped here for provender. They did not intend to stay, however, because the Empire is advancing south along the Jiet River and they wished to be in place to confront Galbatorix’s army when it arrives. The Varden could be anywhere between Cithrí and the Jiet River. This is only my humble opinion, but I would say the best place to look for them would be the Burning Plains.”
“The Burning Plains?”
Dahwar smiled. “You may know them by their old name, then, the name the elves use: Du Völlar Eldrvarya.”
“Ah, yes.” Now Eragon remembered. He had read about them in one of the histories Oromis assigned him. The plains—which contained huge deposits of peat—lay along the eastern side of the Jiet River where Surda’s border crossed it and had been the site of a skirmish between the Riders and the Forsworn. During the fight, the dragons inadvertently lit the peat with the flames from their mouths and the fire had burrowed underground, where it remained smoldering ever since. The land had been rendered uninhabitable by the noxious fumes that poured out of the glowing vents in the charred earth.
A shiver crawled down Eragon’s left side as he recalled his premonition: banks of warriors colliding upon an orange and yellow field, accompanied by the harsh screams of gore-crows and the whistle of black arrows. He shivered again. Fate is converging upon us, he said to Saphira. Then, gesturing at the map: Have you seen enough?
I have.
In short order, he and Orik packed the supplies, remounted Saphira, and from her back thanked Dahwar for his service. As Saphira was about to take off again, Eragon frowned; a note of discord had entered the minds he was monitoring. “Dahwar, two grooms in the stables have gotten into an argument and one of them, Tathal, intends to commit murder. You can stop him, though, if you send men right away.”
Dahwar widened his eyes in an expression of astonishment, and even Orik twisted round to look at Eragon. The seneschal asked, “How do you know this, Shadeslayer?”
Eragon merely said, “Because I am a Rider.”
Then Saphira unfurled her wings, and everyone on the ground ran back to avoid being battered by the rush of air as she flapped downward and soared into the sky. As Borromeo Castle dwindled behind them, Orik said, “Can you hear my thoughts, Eragon?”
“Do you want me to try? I haven’t, you know.”
“Try.”
Frowning, Eragon concentrated his attention on the dwarf’s consciousness and was surprised to find Orik’s mind well protected behind thick mental barriers. He could sense Orik’s presence, but not his thoughts and feelings. “Nothing.”
Orik grinned. “Good. I wanted to make sure I hadn’t forgotten my old lessons.”
By unspoken consent, they did not stop for the night, but rather forged onward through the blackened sky. Of the moon and stars they saw no sign, no flash or pale gleam to breach the oppressive gloom. The dead hours bloated and sagged and, it seemed to Eragon, clung to each second as if reluctant to surrender to the past.
When the sun finally returned—bringing with it its welcome light—Saphira landed by the edge of a small lake so Eragon and Orik could stretch their legs, relieve themselves, and eat breakfast without the constant movement they experienced on her back.
They had just taken off again when a long, low brown cloud appeared on the edge of the horizon, like a smudge of walnut ink on a sheet of white paper. The cloud grew wider and wider as Saphira approached it, until by late morning it obscured the
entire land beneath a pall of foul vapors.
They had reached the Burning Plains of Alagaësia.
THE BURNING PLAINS
Eragon coughed as Saphira descended through the layers of smoke, angling toward the Jiet River, which was hidden behind the haze. He blinked and wiped back tears. The fumes made his eyes smart.
Closer to the ground, the air cleared, giving Eragon an unobstructed view of their destination. The rippling veil of black and crimson smoke filtered the sun’s rays in such a way that everything below was bathed in a lurid orange. Occasional rents in the besmirched sky allowed pale bars of light to strike the ground, where they remained, like pillars of translucent glass, until they were truncated by the shifting clouds.
The Jiet River lay before them, as thick and turgid as a gorged snake, its crosshatched surface reflecting the same ghastly hue that pervaded the Burning Plains. Even when a splotch of undiluted light happened to fall upon the river, the water appeared chalky white, opaque and opalescent—almost as if it were the milk of some fearsome beast—and seemed to glow with an eerie luminescence all its own.
Two armies were arrayed along the eastern banks of the oozing waterway. To the south were the Varden and the men of Surda, entrenched behind multiple layers of defense, where they displayed a fine panoply of woven standards, ranks of proud tents, and the picketed horses of King Orrin’s cavalry. Strong as they were, their numbers paled in comparison to the size of the force assembled in the north. Galbatorix’s army was so large, it measured three miles across on its leading edge and how many in length it was impossible to tell, for the individual men melded into a shadowy mass in the distance.