Eldest [en]

“Then why don’t you fight Galbatorix yourself instead of hiding in Du Weldenvarden?”

Vanir stiffened with outrage. “Because,” he said, cool and haughty, “I’m not a Rider. And if I were, I would not be such a coward as you.”

No one moved or spoke on the field.

His back to Vanir, Eragon leaned on Zar’roc and craned his neck toward the sky, snarling to himself. He knows nothing. This is just one more test to overcome.

“Coward, I say. Your blood is as thin as the rest of your race’s. I think that Saphira was confused by Galbatorix’s wiles and made the wrong choice of Rider.” The spectating elves gasped at Vanir’s words and muttered among themselves with open disapproval for his atrocious breach of etiquette.

Eragon ground his teeth. He could stand insults to himself, but not to Saphira. She was already moving when his pent-up frustration, fear, and pain burst within him and he whirled around, the tip of Zar’roc whistling through the air.

The blow would have killed Vanir had he not blocked it at the last second. He looked surprised by the ferocity of the attack. Holding nothing in reserve, Eragon drove Vanir to the center of the field, jabbing and slashing like a madman — determined to hurt the elf however he could. He nicked Vanir on the hip with enough force to draw blood, even with Zar’roc’s blunted edge.

At that instant, Eragon’s back ruptured in an explosion of agony so intense, he experienced it with all five senses: as a deafening, crashing waterfall of sound; a metallic taste that coated his tongue; an acrid, eye-watering stench in his nostrils, redolent of vinegar; pulsing colors; and, above all, the feeling that Durza had just laid open his back.

He could see Vanir standing over him with a derisive sneer. It occurred to Eragon that Vanir was very young.

After the seizure, Eragon wiped the blood from his mouth with his hand and showed it to Vanir, asking, “Thin enough?” Vanir did not deign to respond, but rather sheathed his sword and walked away.

“Where are you going?” demanded Eragon. “We have unfinished business, 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.

At Oromis’s hut, the day resumed its usual pattern: Saphira accompanied 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 Eragon 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 purposeless in the vast and hostile pine-needle barrens.

Like the dragons in Alagaesia, 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 volume until Eragon’s ears rang. Standing, Oromis hooked the kettle off the 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, contemplating 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 summoned 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?”

“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 indicative of an inferior mind. Am I clear?”

“Yes, Master.”

The elf raised his mug to his lips and drank, his bright eyes fixed on Eragon 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, accelerating 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