After a moment, he noticed something else: a block of gray stone—granite perhaps—eight feet tall, which stood off to their right, beyond where the light had previously reached. And chained standing to the block was Nasuada, wearing a simple white tunic. She was watching them with wide-open eyes, though she could not speak, for a knotted cloth was tied over her mouth. She looked worn and tired but otherwise healthy.
Relief shot through Eragon. He had not dared hope to find her alive. “Nasuada!” he shouted. “Are you all right?”
She nodded.
“Has he forced you to swear fealty to him?”
She shook her head.
“Do you think I would let her tell you if I had?” asked Galbatorix. As Eragon looked back at the king, he saw Murtagh cast a quick, concerned glance toward Nasuada, and he wondered at its significance.
“Well, have you?” Eragon asked in a challenging tone.
“As it so happens, no. I decided to wait until I had gathered all of you together. Now that I have, none shall leave until you have pledged yourself in service to me, nor shall you leave until I have learned the true name of each and every one of you. That is why you are here. Not to kill me, but to bow down before me and to finally put an end to this noisome rebellion.”
Saphira growled again, and Eragon said, “We won’t give in.” Even to his own ears, his words seemed weak and toothless.
“Then they will die,” Galbatorix replied, pointing at the two children. “And in the end, your defiance will change nothing. You do not seem to understand; you have already lost. Outside, the battle fares badly for your friends. Soon my men will force them to surrender, and this war will arrive at its destined conclusion. Fight if you wish. Deny what is before you if it comforts you. But nothing you do can change your fate, or that of Alagaësia.”
Eragon refused to believe that he and Saphira would have to spend the rest of their lives answering to Galbatorix. Saphira felt the same, and her anger joined with his, burning away every last bit of his fear and caution, and he said, “Vae weohnata ono vergarí, eka thäet otherúm.” We will kill you, I swear it.
For a moment, Galbatorix appeared aggravated; then he spoke the Word again—as well as other words in the ancient language besides—and the vow Eragon had uttered seemed to lose all meaning; the words lay in his mind like a handful of dead leaves, devoid of any power to impel or inspire.
The king’s upper lip curved in a sneer. “Swear all the oaths you want. They shall not bind you, not unless I allow them to.”
“I’ll still kill you,” Eragon muttered. He understood that if he continued to resist, it might mean the lives of the two children, but Galbatorix had to be killed, and if the price of his death was the deaths of the boy and the girl, then that was a cost Eragon was willing to accept. He knew he would hate himself for it. He knew that he would see the faces of the children in his dreams for the rest of his life. But if he did not challenge Galbatorix, then all would be lost.
Do not hesitate, said Umaroth. Now is the time to strike.
Eragon raised his voice. “Why won’t you fight me? Are you a coward? Or are you too weak to match yourself against me? Is that why you hide behind these children like a frightened old woman?”
Eragon …, said Arya in a warning tone.
“I am not the only one who brought a child here today,” replied the king, the lines on his face deepening.
“There is a difference: Elva agreed to come. But you didn’t answer the question. Why won’t you fight? Is it that you’ve spent so long sitting on your throne and eating sweets that you’ve forgotten how to swing a sword?”
“You would not want to fight me, youngling,” growled the king.
“Prove it, then. Release me and meet me in honest battle. Show that you are still a warrior to be reckoned with. Or live with the knowledge that you are a sniveling coward who dares not face even a single opponent without the help of your Eldunarí. You killed Vrael himself! Why should you fear me? Why should—”
“Enough!” said Galbatorix. A flush had crept onto his hollow cheeks. Then, like quicksilver, his mood changed, and he bared his teeth in a fearsome approximation of a smile. He rapped the arm of his seat with his knuckles. “I did not gain this throne by accepting every challenge put to me. Nor have I held it by meeting my foes in ‘honest battle.’ What you have yet to learn, youngling, is that it does not matter how you achieve victory, only that you achieve it.”
“You’re wrong. It does matter,” said Eragon.
“I will remind you of that when you are sworn to me. However …” Galbatorix tapped the pommel of his sword. “Since you wish so badly to fight, I will grant your request.” The flare of hope that Eragon felt vanished when Galbatorix added, “But not with me. With Murtagh.”
At those words, Murtagh flashed an angry look at Eragon.
The king stroked the fringe of his beard. “I would like to know, once and for all, which of you is the better warrior. You will fight as you are, without magic or Eldunarí, until one of you is unable to continue. You may not kill each other—that I forbid—but short of death, I will allow most anything. It will be rather entertaining, I think, to watch brother fight brother.”
“No,” said Eragon. “Not brothers. Half brothers. Brom was my father, not Morzan.”
For the first time, Galbatorix appeared surprised. Then one corner of his mouth twisted upward. “Of course. I should have seen it; the truth is in your face for any who know what to look for. This duel will be all the more fitting, then. The son of Brom pitted against the son of Morzan. Fate indeed has a sense of humor.”
Murtagh also reacted with surprise. He controlled his face too well for Eragon to determine whether the information pleased or upset him, but Eragon knew that it had thrown him off balance. That had been his plan. If Murtagh was distracted, it would be that much easier for Eragon to defeat him. And he did intend to defeat him, regardless of the blood they shared.
“Letta,” said Galbatorix with a slight motion of his hand.
Eragon staggered as the spell holding him vanished.
Then the king said, “Gánga aptr,” and Arya, Elva, and Saphira slid backward, leaving a wide space between them and the dais. The king muttered a few other words, and most of the lanterns in the chamber dimmed so that the area in front of the throne was the brightest spot in the room.
“Come now,” said Galbatorix to Murtagh. “Join Eragon, and let us see which of you is the more skilled.”
Scowling, Murtagh walked to a spot several yards from where Eragon stood. He drew Zar’roc—the blade of the crimson sword looked as if it were already coated in blood—then lifted his shield and settled into a crouch.
After glancing at Saphira and Arya, Eragon did the same.
“Now fight!” cried Galbatorix, and clapped his hands.
Sweating, Eragon began to move toward Murtagh, even as Murtagh moved toward him.
MUSCLE AGAINST METAL
oran yelped and jumped aside as a brick chimney smashed to the ground in front of him, followed by the body of one of the Empire’s archers.
He shook the sweat from his eyes, then moved around the body and the pile of scattered bricks, hopping from one patch of open ground to the next, much as he used to hop along the stones by the Anora River.