to respond, but rather sheathed his sword and walked away.
“Where are you going?” demanded Eragon. “We have unfinished busi-
ness, you and I.”
“You are in no fit condition to spar,” scoffed the elf.
“Try me.” Eragon might be inferior to the elves, but he refused to give
them the satisfaction of fulfilling their low expectations of him. He
would earn their respect through sheer persistence, if nothing else.
He insisted on completing Oromis’s assigned hour, after which Saphira
marched up to Vanir and touched him on the chest with the point of
one of her ivory talons. Dead, she said. Vanir paled. The other elves
edged away from him.
Once they were in the air, Saphira said, Oromis was right.
About what?
You give more of yourself when you have an opponent.
349
At Oromis’s hut, the day resumed its usual pattern: Saphira accompa-
nied Glaedr for her instruction while Eragon remained with Oromis.
Eragon was horrified when he discovered that Oromis expected him to
do the Rimgar in addition to his earlier exercises. It took all of his courage
to obey. His apprehension proved groundless, though, for the Dance of
Snake and Crane was too gentle to injure him.
That, coupled with his meditation in the secluded glade, provided Er-
agon with his first opportunity since the previous day to order his
thoughts and consider the question that Oromis had posed him.
While he did, he observed his red ants invade a smaller, rival anthill,
overrunning the inhabitants and stealing their resources. By the end of the
massacre, only a handful of the rival ants were left alive, alone and pur-
poseless in the vast and hostile pine-needle barrens.
Like the dragons in Alagaësia, thought Eragon. His connection to the
ants vanished as he considered the dragons’ unhappy fate. Bit by bit, an
answer to his problem revealed itself to him, an answer that he could live
with and believe in.
He finished his meditations and returned to the hut. This time Oromis
seemed reasonably satisfied with what Eragon had accomplished.
As Oromis served the midday meal, Eragon said, “I know why fighting
Galbatorix is worth it, though thousands of people may die.”
“Oh?” Oromis seated himself. “Do tell me.”
“Because Galbatorix has already caused more suffering over the past
hundred years than we ever could in a single generation. And unlike a
normal tyrant, we cannot wait for him to die. He could rule for centuries
or millennia—persecuting and tormenting people the entire time—unless
we stop him. If he became strong enough, he would march on the
dwarves and you here in Du Weldenvarden and kill or enslave both races.
And. .,” Eragon rubbed the heel of his palm against the edge of the table,
“. . because rescuing the two eggs from Galbatorix is the only way to save
the dragons.”
The strident warble of Oromis’s teakettle intruded, escalating in vol-
ume until Eragon’s ears rang. Standing, Oromis hooked the kettle off the
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cookfire and poured the water for blueberry tea. The creases around his
eyes softened. “Now,” he said, “you understand.”
“I understand, but I take no pleasure in it.”
“Nor should you. But now we can be confident that you won’t shrink
from the path when you are confronted by the injustices and atrocities
that the Varden will inevitably commit. We cannot afford to have you
consumed by doubts when your strength and focus are most needed.”
Oromis steepled his fingers and gazed into the dark mirror of his tea, con-
templating whatever he saw in its tenebrous reflection. “Do you believe
that Galbatorix is evil?”
“Of course!”
“Do you believe that he considers himself evil?”
“No, I doubt it.”
Oromis tapped his forefingers against each other. “Then you must also
believe that Durza was evil?”
The fragmented memories Eragon had gleaned from Durza when they
fought in Tronjheim returned to him now, reminding him how the young
Shade—Carsaib, then—had been enslaved by the wraiths he had sum-
moned to avenge the death of his mentor, Haeg. “He wasn’t evil himself,
but the spirits that controlled him were.”
“And what of the Urgals?” asked Oromis, sipping his tea. “Are they
evil?”
Eragon’s knuckles whitened as he gripped his spoon. “When I think of
death, I see an Urgal’s face. They’re worse than beasts. The things they
have done. .” He shook his head, unable to continue.
“Eragon, what kind of opinion would you form of humans if all you
knew of them were the actions of your warriors on the field of battle?”
“That’s not. .” He took a deep breath. “It’s different. Urgals deserve to be
wiped out, every last one of them.”
“Even their females and children? The ones who haven’t harmed you
and likely never will? The innocents? Would you kill them and condemn
an entire race to the void?”
351
“They wouldn’t spare us, given the chance.”
“Eragon!” exclaimed Oromis in biting tones. “I never want to hear you
use that excuse again, that because someone else has done—or would
do—something means that you should too. It’s lazy, repugnant, and in-
dicative of an inferior mind. Am I clear?”
“Yes, Master.”
The elf raised his mug to his lips and drank, his bright eyes fixed on Er-
agon the entire time. “What do you actually know of Urgals?”
“I know their strengths, weaknesses, and how to kill them. It’s all I need
to know.”
“Why do they hate and fight humans, though? What about their history
and legends, or the way in which they live?”
“Does it matter?”
Oromis sighed. “Just remember,” he said gently, “that at a certain point,
your enemies may have to become your allies. Such is the nature of life.”
Eragon resisted the urge to argue. He swirled his own tea in its mug, ac-
celerating the liquid into a black whirlpool with a white lens of foam at
the bottom of the vortex. “Is that why Galbatorix enlisted the Urgals?”
“That is not an example I would have chosen, but yes.”
“It seems strange that he befriended them. After all, they were the ones
who killed his dragon. Look what he did to us, the Riders, and we
weren’t even responsible for his loss.”
“Ah,” said Oromis, “mad Galbatorix may be, but he’s still as cunning as
a fox. I guess that he intended to use the Urgals to destroy the Varden
and the dwarves—and others, if he had triumphed in Farthen Dûr—
thereby removing two of his enemies while simultaneously weakening
the Urgals so that he could dispose of them at his leisure.”
Study of the ancient language devoured the afternoon, whereupon they
took up the practice of magic. Much of Oromis’s lectures concerned the
352
proper way in which to control various forms of energy, such as light,
heat, electricity, and even gravity. He explained that since these forces
consumed strength faster than any other type of spell, it was safer to find
them already in existence in nature and then shape them with gramarye,
instead of trying to create them from nothing.
Abandoning the subject, Oromis asked, “How would you kill with
magic?”
“I’ve done it many ways,” said Eragon. “I’ve hunted with a pebble—
moving and aiming it with magic—as well as using the word jierda to
break Urgals’ legs and necks. Once, with thrysta, I stopped a man’s heart.”
“There are more efficient methods,” revealed Oromis. “What does it
take to kill a man, Eragon? A sword through the chest? A broken neck?
The loss of blood? All it takes is for a single artery in the brain to be
pinched off, or for certain nerves to be severed. With the right spell, you
could obliterate an army.”
“I should have thought of that in Farthen Dûr,” said Eragon, disgusted
with himself. Not just Farthen Dûr either, but also when the Kull chased us
from the Hadarac Desert. “Again, why didn’t Brom teach me this?”
“Because he did not expect you to face an army for months or years to
come; it is not a tool given to untested Riders.”
“If it’s so easy to kill people, though, what’s the point of us or Galba-
torix raising an army?”
“To be succinct, tactics. Magicians are vulnerable to physical attack
when they are embroiled in their mental struggles. Therefore, they need
warriors to protect them. And the warriors must be shielded, at least in
part, from magical attacks, else they would be slain within minutes.
These limitations mean that when armies confront one another, their
magicians are scattered throughout the bulk of their forces, close to the
edge but not so close as to be in danger. The magicians on both sides
open their minds and attempt to sense if anyone is using or is about to
use magic. Since their enemies might be beyond their mental reach, ma-
gicians also erect wards around themselves and their warriors to stop or
lessen long-range attacks, such as a pebble sent flying toward their head
from a mile away.”
“Surely one man can’t defend an entire army,” said Eragon.
353
“Not alone, but with enough magicians, you can provide a reasonable
amount of protection. The greatest danger in this sort of conflict is that a
clever magician may think of a unique attack that can bypass your wards
without tripping them. That itself could be enough to decide a battle.
“Also,” said Oromis, “you must keep in mind that the ability to use
magic is exceedingly rare among the races. We elves are no exception,
although we have a greater allotment of spellweavers than most, as a re-
sult of oaths we bound ourselves with centuries ago. The majority of
those blessed with magic have little or no appreciable talent; they strug-
gle to heal even so much as a bruise.”
Eragon nodded. He had encountered magicians like that in the Varden.
“But it still takes the same amount of energy to accomplish a task.”
“Energy, yes, but lesser magicians find it harder than you or I do to feel
the flow of magic and immerse themselves in it. Few magicians are strong
enough to pose a threat to an entire army. And those who are usually
spend the bulk of their time during battles evading, tracking, or fighting
their opposites, which is fortunate from the standpoint of ordinary war-
riors, else they would all soon be killed.”
Troubled, Eragon said, “The Varden don’t have many magicians.”
“That is one reason why you are so important.”
A moment passed as Eragon reflected on what Oromis had told him.
“These wards, do they only drain energy from you when they are acti-
vated?”
“Aye.”
“Then, given enough time, you could acquire countless layers of wards.
You could make yourself. .” He struggled with the ancient language as he
attempted to express himself. “. . untouchable?. . impregnable?. . impreg-
nable to any assault, magical or physical.”
“Wards,” said Oromis, “rely upon the strength of your body. If that
strength is exceeded, you die. No matter how many wards you have, you
will only be able to block attacks so long as your body can sustain the
output of energy.”
“And Galbatorix’s strength has been increasing each year. . How is that
possible?”
354
It was a rhetorical question, yet when Oromis remained silent, his al-
mond eyes fixed on a trio of swallows pirouetting overhead, Eragon real-
ized that the elf was considering how best to answer him. The birds
chased each other for several minutes. When they flitted from view,
Oromis said, “It is not appropriate to have this discussion at the present.”
“Then you know?” exclaimed Eragon, astonished.
“I do. But that information must wait until later in your training. You
are not ready for it.” Oromis looked at Eragon, as if expecting him to ob-
ject.
Eragon bowed. “As you wish, Master.” He could never prize the infor-
mation out of Oromis until the elf was willing to share it, so why try?
Still, he wondered what could be so dangerous that Oromis dared not tell
him, and why the elves had kept it secret from the Varden. Another
thought presented itself to him, and he said, “If battles with magicians are
conducted like you said, then why did Ajihad let me fight without wards
in Farthen Dûr? I didn’t even know that I needed to keep my mind open
for enemies. And why didn’t Arya kill most or all of the Urgals? No ma-
gicians were there to oppose her except for Durza, and he couldn’t have
defended his troops when he was underground.”
“Did not Ajihad have Arya or one of Du Vrangr Gata set defenses
around you?” demanded Oromis.
“No, Master.”
“And you fought thus?”
“Yes, Master.”
Oromis’s eyes unfocused, withdrawing into himself as he stood mo-
tionless on the greensward. He spoke without warning: “I have consulted
Arya, and she says that the Twins of the Varden were ordered to assess
your abilities. They told Ajihad you were competent in all magic, includ-
ing wards. Neither Ajihad nor Arya doubted their judgment on that mat-
ter.”
“Those smooth-tongued, bald-pated, tick-infested, treacherous dogs,”
swore Eragon. “They tried to get me killed!” Reverting to his own lan-