Paolini, Christopher - Inheritance Trilogy, Book 2 - Eldest (v1.5) (22 page)

Eragon grinned and reached out with his mind, trying to touch their

thoughts. As he did, the three recoiled and shrieked, opening their maws

like hungry snakes. Their piercing keen was mental as well as physical. It

tore through Eragon with a savage strength, seeking to incapacitate him.

Saphira felt it too. Continuing the racking cry, the creatures attacked

with razor claws.

Hold on, warned Saphira. She folded her left wing and spun halfway

around, avoiding two of the animals, then flapped quickly, rising above

the other. At the same time, Eragon worked furiously to block the shriek.

The instant his mind was clear, he reached for the magic. Don’t kill them,

said Saphira. I want the experience.

Though the creatures were more agile than Saphira, she had the advan-

tage of bulk and strength. One of the creatures dove at her. She flipped

upside down—falling backward—and kicked the animal in the chest.

The shriek dropped in intensity as her injured foe retreated.

Saphira flared her wings, looping right side up so she faced the other

two as they converged on her. She arched her neck, Eragon heard a deep

rumble between her ribs, and then a jet of flame roared from her jaws. A

molten-blue halo engulfed Saphira’s head, flashing through her gemlike

scales until she sparkled gloriously and seemed to be lit from within.

The two dragon-beasts squawked in dismay and veered to either side.

The mental assault ceased as they sped away, sinking back toward the

mountainside.

136

You almost threw me off, said Eragon, loosening his cramped arms from

around her neck.

She looked at him smugly. Almost, but not quite.

That’s true, he laughed.

Flushed with the thrill of victory, they returned to the rafts. As Saphira

landed amid two great fins of water, Orik shouted, “Are you hurt?”

“No,” called Eragon. The icy water whirled around his legs as Saphira

swam to the side of the raft. “Were they another race unique to the

Beors?”

Orik pulled him onto the raft. “We call them Fanghur. They’re not as

intelligent as dragons and they can’t breathe fire, but they are still formi-

dable foes.”

“So we discovered.” Eragon massaged his temples in an attempt to alle-

viate the headache the Fanghur’s attack had brought on. “Saphira was

more than a match for them, however.”

Of course, she said.

“It’s how they hunt,” explained Orik. “They use their minds to immobi-

lize their prey while they kill it.”

Saphira flicked water at Eragon with her tail. It’s a good idea. Maybe I’ll

try it next time I go hunting.

He nodded. It could come in handy in a fight too.

Arya came to the edge of the raft. “I’m glad you did not kill them.

Fanghur are rare enough that those three would have been sorely missed.”

“They still manage to eat enough of our herds,” growled Thorv from in-

side the cabin. The dwarf marched out to Eragon, champing irritably un-

der the twisted knots of his beard. “Do not fly anymore while in these

Beor Mountains, Shadeslayer. It is difficult enough to keep you unharmed

without you and thine dragon fighting wind-vipers.”

“We’ll stay on the ground until we reach the plains,” promised Eragon.

137

“Good.”

When they stopped for the night, the dwarves moored the rafts to as-

pen trees along the mouth of a small stream. Ama started a fire while Er-

agon helped Ekksvar pull Snowfire onto land. They picketed the stallion

on a strip of grass.

Thorv oversaw the erection of six large tents. Hedin gathered firewood

to last until morning, and Dûthmér carried supplies off the second raft

and began making dinner. Arya took up watch on the edge of camp,

where she was soon joined by Ekksvar, Ama, and Tríhga when they fin-

ished their tasks.

When Eragon realized he had nothing to do, he squatted by the fire

with Orik and Shrrgnien. As Shrrgnien pulled off his gloves and held his

scarred hands over the flames, Eragon noticed that a polished steel stud—

perhaps a quarter of an inch long—protruded from each of the dwarf’s

knuckles, except for on his thumbs.

“What are those?” he asked.

Shrrgnien looked at Orik and laughed. “These are mine Ascûdgamln. .

mine ‘fists of steel.’ ” Without standing, he twisted and punched the bole

of an aspen, leaving four symmetrical holes in the bark. Shrrgnien laughed

again. “They are good for hitting things, eh?”

Eragon’s curiosity and envy were aroused. “How are they made? I mean,

how are the spikes attached to your hands?”

Shrrgnien hesitated, trying to find the right words. “A healer puts you

in a deep sleep, so you feel no pain. Then a hole is—is drilled, yes?—is

drilled down through the joints. .” He broke off and spoke quickly to

Orik in the dwarf language.

“A metal socket is embedded in each hole,” explained Orik. “Magic is

used to seal it in place, and when the warrior has fully recovered, various-

sized spikes can be threaded into the sockets.”

“Yes, see,” said Shrrgnien, grinning. He gripped the stud above his left

index finger, carefully twisted it free of his knuckle, and then handed it

to Eragon.

Eragon smiled as he rolled the sharp lump around his palm. “I wouldn’t

mind having ‘fists of steel’ myself.” He returned the stud to Shrrgnien.

138

“It’s a dangerous operation,” warned Orik. “Few knurlan get

Ascûdgamln because you can easily lose the use of your hands if the drill

goes too deep.” He raised his fist and showed it to Eragon. “Our bones are

thicker than yours. It might not work for a human.”

“I’ll remember that.” Still, Eragon could not help but imagine what it

would be like to fight with Ascûdgamln, to be able to strike anything he

wanted with impunity, including armored Urgals. He loved the idea.

After eating, Eragon retired to his tent. The fire provided enough light

that he could see the silhouette of Saphira nestled alongside the tent, like

a figure cut from black paper and pasted against the canvas wall.

Eragon sat with the blankets pulled over his legs and stared at his lap,

drowsy but unwilling to sleep quite yet. Unbidden, his mind turned to

thoughts of home. He wondered how Roran, Horst, and everyone else

from Carvahall was doing, and if the weather in Palancar Valley was

warm enough for the farmers to start planting their crops. Longing and

sadness suddenly gripped Eragon.

He removed a wood bowl from his pack and, taking his waterskin,

filled it to the brim with liquid. Then he focused on an image of Roran

and whispered, “Draumr kópa.”

As always, the water went black before brightening to reveal the object

being scryed. Eragon saw Roran sitting alone in a candlelit bedroom he

recognized from Horst’s house. Roran must have given up his job in Ther-

insford, realized Eragon. His cousin leaned on his knees and clasped his

hands, staring at the far wall with an expression that Eragon knew meant

Roran was grappling with some difficult problem. Still, Roran seemed

well enough, if a bit drawn, which comforted Eragon. After a minute, he

released the magic, ending the spell and clearing the surface of the water.

Reassured, Eragon emptied the bowl, then lay down, pulling the blan-

kets up to his chin. He closed his eyes and sank into the warm dusk that

separates consciousness and sleep, where reality bends and sways to the

wind of thought, and where creativity blossoms in its freedom from

boundaries and all things are possible.

Slumber soon took him. Most of his rest was uneventful, but right be-

fore he woke, the usual night phantasms were replaced with a vision as

139

clear and vibrant as any waking experience.

He saw a tortured sky, black and crimson with smoke. Crows and eagles

swirled high above flights of arrows that arched from one side to another of

a great battle. A man sprawled in the clotted mud with a dented helm and

bloody mail—his face concealed behind an upthrown arm.

An armored hand entered Eragon’s view. The gauntlet was so near it blot-

ted out half the world with polished steel. Like an inexorable machine, the

thumb and last three fingers curled into a fist, leaving the trunk of the index

finger to point at the downed man with all the authority of fate itself.

The vision still filled Eragon’s mind when he crawled out of the tent.

He found Saphira some distance from the camp, gnawing on a furry

lump. When he told her what he had seen, she paused in midbite, then

jerked her neck and swallowed a strip of meat.

The last time this occurred, she said, it proved to be a true prediction of

events elsewhere. Do you think a battle is in progress in Alagaësia?

He kicked a loose branch. I’m not sure.... Brom said you could only scry

people, places, and things that you had already seen. Yet I’ve never seen

this place. Nor had I seen Arya when I first dreamt about her in Teirm.

Perhaps Togira Ikonoka will be able to explain it.

As they prepared to leave, the dwarves seemed much more relaxed

now that they were a good distance from Tarnag. When they started pol-

ing down the Az Ragni, Ekksvar—who was steering Snowfire’s raft—

began chanting in his rough bass:

Down the rushing mere-wash

Of Kílf’s welling blood,

We ride the twisting timbers,

For hearth, clan, and honor.

Under the ernes’ sky-vat,

140

Through the ice-wolves’ forest bowls,

We ride the gory wood,

For iron, gold, and diamond.

Let hand-ringer and bearded gaper fill my grip

And battle-leaf guard my stone

As I leave the halls of my fathers

For the empty land beyond.

The other dwarves joined Ekksvar, slipping into Dwarvish as they con-

tinued on to other verses. The low throb of their voices accompanied Er-

agon as he carefully made his way to the head of the raft, where Arya sat

cross-legged.

“I had a. . vision during my sleep,” said Eragon. Arya looked at him with

interest, and he recounted the images he had seen. “If it’s scrying, then—”

“It’s not scrying,” said Arya. She spoke with deliberate slowness, as if to

prevent any misunderstanding. “I thought for a long time about how you

saw me imprisoned in Gil’ead, and I believe that as I lay unconscious, my

spirit was searching for help, wherever I might find it.”

“But why me?”

Arya nodded toward where Saphira undulated through the water. “I

grew accustomed to Saphira’s presence during the fifteen years I guarded

her egg. I was reaching out for anything that felt familiar when I touched

your dreams.”

“Are you really strong enough to contact someone in Teirm from

Gil’ead? Especially if you were drugged.”

A ghost of a smile touched Arya’s lips. “I could stand on the very gates

of Vroengard and still speak with you as clearly as I am now.” She

paused. “If you did not scry me in Teirm, then you could not have scryed

this new dream. It must be a premonition. They have been known to oc-

141

cur throughout the sentient races, but especially among magic users.”

Eragon clutched the netting around a bundle of supplies as the raft

lurched. “If what I saw will come to pass, then how can we change any-

thing that happens? Do our choices matter? What if I threw myself off

the raft right now and drowned?”

“But you won’t.” Arya dipped her left forefinger in the river and stared

at the single drop that clung to her skin, like a quivering lens. “Once, long

ago, the elf Maerzadí had a premonition that he would accidentally kill

his son in battle. Rather than live to see it happen, he committed suicide,

saving his son, and at the same time proving that the future isn’t set.

Short of killing yourself, however, you can do little to change your des-

tiny, since you don’t know what choices will lead you to the particular

point of time that you saw.” She flipped her hand and the drop splattered

against the log between them. “We know that it’s possible to retrieve in-

formation from the future—fortunetellers can often sense the paths a

person’s life may take—but we’ve been unable to refine the process to

the point where you can choose what, where, or when you want to see.”

Eragon found the entire concept of funneling knowledge through time

profoundly disturbing. It raised too many questions about the nature of

reality. Whether fate and destiny really exist, the only thing I can do is en-

joy the present and live as honorably as possible. Yet he could not help

asking, “What’s to stop me, though, from scrying one of my memories?

I’ve seen everything in them. . so I should be able to view them with

magic.”

Arya’s gaze darted to meet his. “If you value your life, never attempt it.

Many years ago, several of our spellweavers devoted themselves to de-

feating time’s enigmas. When they tried to summon up the past, they

only succeeded in creating a blurred image on their mirror before the

spell consumed their energy and killed them. We made no more experi-

ments on the subject. It is argued that the spell would work if more ma-

gicians participated, but no one is willing to accept the risk and the the-