a mother would her firstborn. “As perfect as the day you were finished.”
Turning her back, she looked up at the knotted branches while she
traced the curves of the pommel. “My entire life I spent hammering these
swords out of ore. Then he came and destroyed them. Centuries of effort
obliterated in an instant. So far as I knew, only four examples of my art
still existed. His sword, Oromis’s, and two others guarded by families
who managed to rescue them from the Wyrdfell.”
Wyrdfell? Eragon dared ask Arya with his mind.
Another name for the Forsworn.
Rhunön turned on Eragon. “Now Zar’roc has returned to me. Of all my
creations, this I least expected to hold again, save for his. How came you
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to possess Morzan’s sword?”
“It was given to me by Brom.”
“Brom?” She hefted Zar’roc. “Brom. . I remember Brom. He begged me
to replace the sword he had lost. Truly, I wished to help him, but I had
already taken my oath. My refusal angered him beyond reason. Oromis
had to knock him unconscious before he would leave.”
Eragon seized on the information with interest. “Your handiwork has
served me well, Rhunön-elda. I would be long dead were it not for
Zar’roc. I killed the Shade Durza with it.”
“Did you now? Then some good has come of it.” Sheathing Zar’roc,
Rhunön returned it to him, though not without reluctance, then looked
past him to Saphira. “Ah. Well met, Skulblaka.”
Well met, Rhunön-elda.
Without bothering to ask permission, Rhunön went up to Saphira’s
shoulder and tapped a scale with one of her blunt fingernails, twisting her
head from side to side in an attempt to peer into the translucent pebble.
“Good color. Not like those brown dragons, all muddy and dark. Properly
speaking, a Rider’s sword should match the hue of his dragon, and this
blue would have made a gorgeous blade. . ” The thought seemed to drain
the energy from her. She returned to the anvil and stared at the wrecked
tongs, as if the will to replace them had deserted her.
Eragon felt that it would be wrong to end the conversation on such a
depressing note, but he could not think of a tactful way to change the
subject. The glimmering corselet caught his attention and, as he studied
it, he was astonished to see that every ring was welded shut. Because the
tiny links cooled so quickly, they usually had to be welded before being
attached to the main piece of mail, which meant that the finest mail—
such as Eragon’s hauberk—was composed of links that were alternately
welded and riveted closed. Unless, it seemed, the smith possessed an elf’s
speed and precision.
Eragon said, “I’ve never seen the equal of your mail, not even among
the dwarves. How do you have the patience to weld every link? Why
don’t you just use magic and save yourself the work?”
He hardly expected the burst of passion that animated Rhunön. She
tossed her short-cropped hair and said, “And rob myself of all pleasure in
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this task? Aye, every other elf and I could use magic to satisfy our de-
sires—and some do—but then what meaning is there in life? How would
you fill your time? Tell me.”
“I don’t know,” he confessed.
“By pursuing that which you love the most. When you can have any-
thing you want by uttering a few words, the goal matters not, only the
journey to it. A lesson for you. You’ll face the same dilemma one day, if
you live long enough. . Now begone! I am weary of this talk.” With that
Rhunön plucked the lid off the forge, retrieved a new pair of tongs, and
immersed a ring in the coals while she worked the bellows with single-
minded intensity.
“Rhunön-elda,” said Arya, “remember, I will return for you on the eve
of the Agaetí Blödhren.” A grunt was her only reply.
The rhythmic peal of steel on steel, as lonely as the cry of a death bird
in the night, accompanied them back through the dogwood tunnel and
onto the path. Behind them, Rhunön was no more than a black figure
bowed over the sullen glow of her forge.
“She made all the Riders’ swords?” asked Eragon. “Every last one?”
“That and more. She’s the greatest smith who has ever lived. I thought
that you should meet her, for her sake and yours.”
“Thank you.”
Is she always so brusque? asked Saphira.
Arya laughed. “Always. For her, nothing matters except her craft, and
she’s famously impatient with anything—or anyone—that interferes with
it. Her eccentricities are well tolerated, though, because of her incredible
skill and accomplishments.”
While she spoke, Eragon tried to work out the meaning of Agaetí
Blödhren. He was fairly sure that blödh stood for blood and, as a result,
that blödhren was blood-oath, but he had never heard of agaetí.
“Celebration,” explained Arya when he asked. “We hold the Blood-oath
Celebration once every century to honor our pact with the dragons. Both
of you are fortunate to be here now, for it is nigh upon us. . ” Her slanted
eyebrows met as she frowned. “Fate has indeed arranged a most auspi-
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cious coincidence.”
She surprised Eragon by leading them deeper into Du Weldenvarden,
down paths tangled with nettles and currant bushes, until the lights
around them vanished and they entered the restless wilderness. In the
darkness, Eragon had to rely on Saphira’s keen night vision so as to not
lose his way. The craggy trees increased in width, crowding closer and
closer together and threatening to form an impenetrable barrier. Just
when it appeared that they could go no farther, the forest ended and they
entered a clearing washed with moonlight from the bright sickle low in
the eastern sky.
A lone pine tree stood in the middle of the clearing. No taller than the
rest of its brethren, it was thicker than a hundred regular trees combined;
in comparison, they looked as puny as windblown saplings. A blanket of
roots radiated from the tree’s massive trunk, covering the ground with
bark-sheathed veins that made it seem as if the entire forest flowed out
from the tree, as if it were the heart of Du Weldenvarden itself. The tree
presided over the woods like a benevolent matriarch, protecting its in-
habitants under the shelter of her branches.
“Behold the Menoa tree,” whispered Arya. “We observe the Agaetí
Blödhren in her shade.”
A cold tingle crawled down Eragon’s side as he recognized the name.
After Angela told his fortune in Teirm, Solembum had come up to him
and said, When the time comes and you need a weapon, look under the roots
of the Menoa tree. Then, when all seems lost and your power is insufficient,
go to the rock of Kuthian and speak your name to open the Vault of Souls.
Eragon could not imagine what kind of weapon might be buried under
the tree, nor how he would go about finding it.
Do you see anything? he asked Saphira.
No, but then I doubt that Solembum’s words will make sense until our
need is clear.
Eragon told Arya about both parts of the werecat’s counsel, although—
as he had with Ajihad and Islanzadí—he kept Angela’s prophecy a secret
because of its personal nature, and because he feared that it might lead
Arya to guess his attraction to her.
When he finished, Arya said, “Werecats rarely offer help, and when
they do, it’s not to be ignored. So far as I know, no weapon is hidden
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here, not even in song or legend. As for the Rock of Kuthian. . the name
echoes in my head like a voice from a half-forgotten dream, familiar yet
strange. I’ve heard it before, though I cannot recall where.”
As they approached the Menoa tree, Eragon’s attention was caught by
the multitude of ants crawling over the roots. Faint black smudges were
all he could see of the insects, but Oromis’s assignment had sensitized
him to the currents of life around him, and he could feel the ants’ primi-
tive consciousness with his mind. He lowered his defenses and allowed
his awareness to flood outward, lightly touching Saphira and Arya and
then expanding beyond them to see what else lived in the clearing.
With unexpected suddenness, he encountered an immense entity, a
sentient being of such a colossal nature, he could not grasp the limits of
its psyche. Even Oromis’s vast intellect, which Eragon had been in con-
tact with in Farthen Dûr, was dwarfed in comparison to this presence.
The very air seemed to thrum with the energy and strength that ema-
nated from. .the tree?
The source was unmistakable.
Deliberate and inexorable, the tree’s thoughts moved at a measured
pace as slow as the creep of ice over granite. It took no notice of Eragon
nor, he was sure, of any single individual. It was entirely concerned with
the affairs of things that grow and flourish in the bright sunlight, with the
dogbane and the lily, the evening primrose and the silky foxglove and the
yellow mustard tall beside the crabapple with its purple blossoms.
“It’s awake!” exclaimed Eragon, shocked into speaking. “I mean. . it’s in-
telligent.” He knew that Saphira felt it too; she cocked her head toward
the Menoa tree, as if listening, then flew to one of its branches, which
were as thick as the road from Carvahall to Therinsford. There she
perched with her tail hanging free, waving the tip of it back and forth,
ever so gracefully. It was such an odd sight, a dragon in a tree, that Eragon
almost laughed.
“Of course she’s awake,” said Arya. Her voice was low and mellow in
the night air. “Shall I tell you the story of the Menoa tree?”
“I’d like that.”
A flash of white streaked across the sky, like a banished specter, and re-
solved itself beside Saphira in the form of Blagden. The raven’s narrow
shoulders and crooked neck gave him the appearance of a miser basking
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in the radiance of a pile of gold. The raven lifted his pallid head and ut-
tered his ominous cry,“ Wyrda!”
“This is what happened. Once there lived a woman, Linnëa, in the years
of spice and wine before our war with the dragons and before we became
as immortal as any beings still composed of vulnerable flesh can be. Lin-
nëa had grown old without the comfort of a mate or children, nor did she
feel the need to seek them out, preferring to occupy herself with the art
of singing to plants, of which she was a master. That is, she did until a
young man came to her door and beguiled her with words of love. His
affections woke a part of Linnëa that she had never suspected existed, a
craving to experience the things that she had unknowingly sacrificed. The
offer of a second chance was too great an opportunity for her to ignore.
She deserted her work and devoted herself to the young man and, for a
time, they were happy.
“But the young man was young, and he began to long for a mate closer
to his own age. His eye fell upon a young woman, and he wooed and won
her. And for a time, they too were happy.
“When Linnëa discovered that she had been spurned, scorned, and
abandoned, she went mad with grief. The young man had done the worst
possible thing; he had given her a taste of the fullness of life, then torn it
away with no more thought than a rooster flitting from one hen to the
next. She found him with the woman and, in her fury, she stabbed him
to death.
“Linnëa knew that what she had done was evil. She also knew that even
if she was exonerated of the murder, she could not return to her previous
existence. Life had lost all joy for her. So she went to the oldest tree in
Du Weldenvarden, pressed herself against it, and sang herself into the
tree, abandoning all allegiance to her own race. For three days and three
nights she sang, and when she finished, she had become one with her be-
loved plants. And through all the millennia since has she kept watch over
the forest. . Thus was the Menoa tree created.”
At the conclusion of her tale, Arya and Eragon sat side by side on the
crest of a huge root, twelve feet off the ground. Eragon bounced his heels
against the tree and wondered if Arya had intended the story as a warning
to him or if it was merely an innocent piece of history.
His doubt hardened into certainty when she asked, “Do you think that
the young man was to blame for the tragedy?”
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“I think,” he said, knowing that a clumsy reply could turn her against
him, “that what he did was cruel. . and that Linnëa overreacted. They
were both at fault.”
Arya stared at him until he was forced to avert his gaze. “They weren’t
suited for each other.”
Eragon began to deny it but then stopped himself. She was right. And
she had maneuvered him so that he had to say it out loud, so that he had
to say it to her. “Perhaps,” he admitted.
Silence accumulated between them like sand piling into a wall that nei-
ther of them was willing to breach. The high-pitched hum of cicadas
echoed from the edge of the clearing. At last he said, “Being home seems
to agree with you.”
“It does.” With unconscious ease, she leaned over and picked up a thin
branch that had fallen from the Menoa tree and began to weave the