Inheritance (97 page)

So he does have his limits
, thought Roran.
Or rather, the Eldunarí does
.

With a shout, he parried the sword of the soldier who had been pressing him. Jerking his shield up, he caught the soldier underneath the jaw, killing the man instantly.

Roran was out of breath and faint from his wounds, so he withdrew
behind one of the pillars and leaned against it. He coughed and spat; his spittle contained blood, but he thought that was just from where he had bitten the inside of his mouth and not from a punctured lung. At least he hoped so. His ribs felt sore enough that one of them might be broken.

A great shout rose from the Varden, and Roran looked around the pillar to see Queen Islanzadí and eleven other elves riding through the battle toward Lord Barst. Again upon Islanzadí’s left shoulder sat the white raven, and he cawed and lifted his wings, the better to balance upon his moving perch. In her hand, Islanzadí carried her sword, while the rest of the elves carried spears with banners attached close to their leaf-shaped blades.

Roran leaned against the pillar, hope rising within him. “Kill him,” he growled.

Barst made no move to avoid the elves but stood waiting for them with his feet spread wide and his mace and shield by his sides, as if he had no need to defend himself.

Throughout the streets, the fighting slowed to a standstill as everyone turned to watch what was about to happen.

The two elves in the lead lowered their spears, and their horses sprang forward into a gallop, the muscles beneath their glossy hides flexing and relaxing as they raced across the short distance that separated them from Barst. For a moment, it looked as if Barst would surely fall; it seemed impossible that anyone on foot could withstand such a charge.

The spears never touched Barst. His wards stopped them an arm’s length from his body, and the hafts shattered in the elves’ hands, leaving them holding useless shards of wood. Then Barst lifted his mace and his shield, and with them he struck the horses on the sides of their heads, breaking their necks and killing them.

The horses fell, and the elves upon them jumped free, twisting in the air as they did.

The next two elves did not have time to change course before they reached Barst. Like their predecessors, they split their spears
on his wards, and then they too jumped free of their horses as Barst struck the animals down.

By then, the eight other elves, including Islanzadí, had managed to turn and rein in their steeds. They trotted in a circle around Barst, keeping their weapons pointed at him, while the four elves on the ground drew their swords and cautiously advanced toward Barst.

The man laughed and hefted his shield as he prepared for their attack. The light caught his face under his helm, and even from a distance Roran could see that it was broad and heavy-browed, with prominent cheekbones. In some ways, it reminded him of the face of an Urgal.

The four elves ran at Barst, each from a different direction, and they cut and stabbed at him in unison. Barst caught one of the swords on his shield, deflected another with his mace, and let his wards stop the blades of the two elves behind him. He laughed again and swung his weapon.

A silver-haired elf threw himself to the side, and the mace flew past harmlessly.

Twice more Barst swung, and twice more the elves evaded him. Barst showed no signs of frustration, but hunched behind his shield and bided his time, like a cave bear waiting for whosoever might be foolish enough to venture into his lair.

Outside the ring of elves, a block of halberd-wielding soldiers took it upon themselves to run screaming toward Queen Islanzadí and her companions. Without pause, the queen lifted her sword over her head, and at her signal, a swarm of buzzing arrows shot out from the ranks of the Varden and felled the soldiers.

Roran shouted with excitement, along with many of the Varden.

Barst had been edging ever closer to the bodies of the four horses he had slain, and now he stepped into their midst so that the bodies formed a low, tumbled wall on either side of him. The elves to his left and his right would have no choice but to leap over the horses if they wished to attack him.

Clever
, Roran thought, frowning.

The elf in front of Barst darted forward, shouting something in the ancient language. Barst seemed to hesitate, and his hesitation encouraged the elf to come closer. Then Barst lunged forward, his mace came crashing down, and the elf crumpled to the ground, broken.

A groan went up from the elves.

The three remaining elves on foot were more cautious thereafter. They continued to circle Barst, running in to attack him on occasion, but mostly keeping their distance.

“Surrender!” exclaimed Islanzadí, and her voice could be heard throughout the streets. “There are more of us than you. No matter how strong you are, in time you will tire and your wards will fail. You cannot win, human.”

“No?” said Barst. He straightened and dropped his shield with a loud clatter.

Sudden dread filled Roran.
Run
, he thought. “Run!” he shouted a half second later.

He was too late.

Bending at the knees, Barst grabbed the neck of one of the horses and, with his left arm alone, threw the horse at Queen Islanzadí.

If she spoke in the ancient language, Roran did not hear it, but she lifted her hand—and the body of the horse stopped in midair, then dropped to the cobblestones, where it landed with an unpleasant sound. On her shoulder, the raven screeched.

Barst was not looking, however. As soon as the carcass left his hand, he scooped up his shield and sprinted toward the nearest of the mounted elven riders. One of the three remaining elves on foot—a woman with a red sash tied around her upper arm—ran toward him and slashed at his back. Barst ignored her.

Over a flat stretch of land, the elves’ horses might have been able to outdistance Barst, but in the limited space between the buildings and the closely packed warriors, Barst was both faster and more nimble. He rammed his shoulder into the ribs of one of the horses, toppling it over, and then swung his mace at an elf upon another horse, knocking the elf from his seat. A horse screamed.

The circle of elven riders disintegrated, each turning in a different direction as they tried to calm their mounts and address the threat before them.

A half-dozen elves ran out from the nearby press of warriors and surrounded Barst, all hacking at him with frenzied speed. Barst disappeared behind them for a moment; then his mace rose up, and three of the elves flew tumbling away. Then another two, and Barst strode forward, blood and gore clinging to the flanges of his black weapon.

“Now!” roared Barst, and throughout the square, hundreds of soldiers ran forward and assailed the elves, forcing them to defend themselves.

“No,” Roran growled, agonized. He would have gone with his warriors to help, but too many bodies—both living and dead—separated them from Barst and the elves. He glanced over at the herbalist, who looked as worried as he felt, and said, “Can’t you do something?”

“I could, but it would mean my life and that of everyone here.”

“Galbatorix as well?”

“He’s too well shielded, but our army would be destroyed along with most everyone in Urû’baen, and even those at our camp might die. Is that what you want?”

Roran shook his head.

“I thought not.”

Moving with uncanny speed, Barst struck elf after elf, felling them with ease. With one of his swings, he caught the shoulder of the elf woman with the red sash and knocked her sprawling onto her back. She pointed at Barst and screamed in the ancient language, but the spell went awry, for another elf slumped forward and toppled out of his saddle, the front of his body split from head to seam.

Barst slew the elf woman with a jab of his mace and then continued to run from horse to horse until he reached Islanzadí on her white mare.

The elf queen did not wait for Barst to kill her steed. She leaped
out of her saddle, her red cape billowing, and her companion, the white raven, beat his wings as he took flight from her shoulder.

Before she alit, Islanzadí lashed out at Barst, her sword a streak of shining steel. Her blade rang as it collided with his wards.

Barst retaliated with a counterstroke, which Islanzadí parried with a deft turn of her wrist, sending the spiked ball of his mace crashing into the cobblestones. Around them, a space formed as friend and foe alike paused to watch them duel. Overhead, the raven circled, shrieking and cursing in the harsh manner of his kind.

Never had Roran seen such a fight. The blows from both Islanzadí and Barst were too fast to follow—only a blur was visible when they struck—and the sound of their weapons clashing was louder than all of the other noises in the city.

Again and again, Barst tried to crush Islanzadí with his mace, even as he had crushed the other elves. But she was too fast for him to catch, and she seemed, if not his equal in strength, at least strong enough to knock aside his blows without difficulty. The other elves, Roran thought, must be aiding her, for she appeared not to tire, despite her exertions.

A Kull and two elves joined Islanzadí. Barst paid them no mind, other than to kill them, one by one, when they made the mistake of venturing within his reach.

Roran found himself gripping the pillar so hard, his hands began to cramp.

Minutes passed as Islanzadí and Barst fought back and forth across the street. In motion, the elf queen was glorious: swift, lithe, and powerful. Unlike Barst, she could not afford to make a single mistake—nor did she—for her wards would not protect her. With every moment, Roran’s admiration for Islanzadí increased, and he felt he was witnessing a battle that would be sung about for centuries to come.

The raven often dove at Barst, seeking to distract him from Islanzadí. After the raven’s first few attempts, Barst ignored the bird,
for the maddened creature could not touch him, and it took pains to keep away from his mace.

The raven seemed to grow frustrated; it shrieked louder and more frequently, and was bolder with its attacks, and with each sally, it edged ever closer to Barst’s head and neck.

Finally, as the bird again swooped toward Barst, the man twisted his mace upward, changing its path in midair, and clipped the raven on its right wing. The bird cried out in pain and dropped a foot toward the ground before struggling to climb back into the sky.

Barst swung at the raven again, but Islanzadí stopped his mace with her sword, and they stood facing each other with their weapons locked together at the top, the blade of her sword wedged between the flanges of his mace.

Elf and human swayed as they pushed against one another. Neither was able to gain the advantage. Then Queen Islanzadí shouted a word in the ancient language, and where their weapons met, a harsh, brilliant light shone forth.

Squinting, Roran shaded his eyes with his hand and averted his gaze.

For a minute, the only sounds were the cries of the wounded and a ringing, bell-like tone that grew louder and louder until it was nearly unbearable. To the side, Roran saw the werecat with Angela cringing and covering its tasseled ears with its paws.

When the sound was at the very height of its intensity, the blade of Islanzadí’s sword cracked, and the light and the bell-like tone vanished.

Then the elf queen smote at Barst’s face with the broken end of her sword, and she said, “Thus I curse you, Barst, son of Berengar!”

Barst allowed her sword to fall upon his wards. Then he swung his mace once more and caught Queen Islanzadí between her neck and her shoulder, and she collapsed to the ground, blood staining her corselet of golden scale armor.

And all was still.

The white raven circled once over Islanzadí’s body and uttered a doleful cry, then flew slowly toward the breach in the outer wall, the feathers of its wounded wing red and crumpled.

A great wail went up from the Varden. Throughout the streets, men cast down their weapons and fled. The elves shouted with rage and grief—a most terrible sound—and every elf with a bow began to fire arrows toward Barst. The arrows burst into flame before they touched him. A dozen elves charged him, but he swatted them aside as if they weighed no more than children. In that moment, another five elves darted in, lifted up Islanzadí’s body, and bore her away upon their leaf-shaped shields.

A sense of disbelief gripped Roran. Of them all, Islanzadí was the one he had least expected to die. He glared at the men who were fleeing and silently cursed them for traitors and cowards; then he returned his gaze to Barst, who was rallying his troops in preparation for driving the Varden and their allies back out of Urû’baen.

The pit in Roran’s stomach grew larger. The elves might continue to fight, but the men, dwarves, and Urgals no longer had a taste for battle. He could see it in their faces. They would break and retreat, and Barst would slaughter them by the hundreds from behind. Nor, Roran was sure, would Barst halt at the city walls. No, he would continue on to the fields beyond and chase the Varden back to their camp, scattering and killing as many as he could.

It was what Roran would do.

Worse, if Barst reached the camp, Katrina would be in danger, and Roran had no illusions as to what would happen if the soldiers caught her.

Roran stared down at his bloody hands. Barst had to be stopped. But how? Roran thought and he thought, running through everything he knew about magic until, at last, he remembered how it had felt when the soldiers were holding him and striking him.

Roran took a deep, shuddering breath.

There was a way, but it was dangerous, incredibly dangerous. If he did what he was contemplating, he knew that he would probably
never see Katrina again, much less their unborn child. Yet the knowledge brought him a certain peace. His life for theirs was a fair trade, and if he could help save the Varden at the same time, then he would be happy to give it.

Katrina …

The decision was an easy one.

Raising his head, he strode over to the herbalist. She looked as shocked and grief-ridden as any of the elves. He touched her on the shoulder with the edge of his shield and said, “I need your help.”