Hello everyone! I recently found this story again and as a little nostalgia project I decided to edit the most glaring errors, as well as translate everything that hadn't been translated yet. If there are any typos or other mistakes that escaped my attention, you can send me a message or something.

This story is a collaboration between me and LadyGwenevere. We have written it alternately, but our parts blend pretty well in my opinion (to the extent that now, years later, I sometimes don't even know who wrote what :P). It takes places after Brisingr, and before Inheritance. It was written before the book was out. This means that all the events of the first three books have happened, but we have changed some things around and added some things, and that this story replaces Inheritance.

Have fun reading!

Slowly they sneaked through the darkness with their swords raised, prepared for the next attack. Their delicate weapons that shimmered in the weak moonlight were dripping with blood. Further and further they infiltrated into the fortress of Galbatorix, fully aware of every sound that echoed around them. Once in a while they were startled by a rat that fled away from them, breaking their concentration for a moment. Whenever that happened, they cursed under their breath while they held their weapons a little looser, but they were still always prepared to strike.
Up until this point their journey on hostile ground had passed very smoothly; they had not encountered anyone, which was fortunate: they realised that otherwise, it might not have ended well for them.

Now they were proceeding deeper into the castle, it became more and more dangerous. They did not know where they were, or where they were heading, and more importantly, where soldiers were hiding. While they were sneaking through the corridors they were on their guard for everything and not even the slightest movement escaped their gaze.

After a long, dark corridor they came into a large round hallway, lit by torches. There was no shadow to be found anywhere, except for one, at the far end of the room. Scanning the room, the Elvish woman looked around and glanced at her companion. He looked just as worried, and she could see in his eyes that this room pleased him just as little as it did her. After a deep breath and a quick prayer, they spurted through the hallway and both of them dived behind one of the large fire beacons. It was awfully quiet in the castle, and this made the two Elves feel even more anxious.

This isn't good.. this really isn't goo..
"Arwýn!" the man roared out of the blue. Arwýn was startled and looked at him, terrified. First, she looked deep into his dark brown eyes where she could read confusion and fear. Then her eyes focused on something behind his head.
"Vreth, look there.." she stuttered. He quickly looked behind him, cursed, and grabbed Arwýn by her waist to pull her further behind the beacon.

A moment after he had pulled her away, five arrows pierced the ground at the place where Arwýn had been standing just seconds ago.
"We should have seen this coming.. It was so eerily quiet." Vreth whispered in Arwýns ear.
"If you ask me, we have work to do." she replied.
He grinned, grabbed his bow and pulled a few of his arrows out of the quiver.
"We can not hide our presence anymore, so why would we try. " he spoke lightly while he collected his arrows from the corpses of Galbatorix' archers. They had walked right into a trap: the big round hallway where they had ended up in had another level: there were big openings in the floor so you could look down onto the lower floor. Many archers were lined up in these openings and they had started shooting at the Elves when they thought they were safe behind the beacon. However, what they had not considered was that Elves were masters of weapons, and within minutes they had eliminated them all. At least, that was what they were thinking..

When Vreth and Arwýn had put away their weapons, they stopped for a moment and Vreth whispered a spell in the Ancient Language; a small, red light appeared at eye level. From his grin Arwýn could make up that his spell had worked: he had created a ball of light that told them exactly in which direction they had to go to find the last dragon egg.

They were getting really close now, deeper and deeper into the castle, closer and closer to their most powerful enemy. After they had walked for a while and had seen lots of torchlit corridors they came into an enormous dark space, filled with many, many wooden crates. It felt ominous, sinister and most of all.. dangerous. Extremely dangerous.

The magical ball of light suddenly stopped, and Vreth and Arwýn were perplexed. How could it be that such an important object was kept in a room like this?! Quickly, they opened a few crates, until they found one with a beautifully decorated metal box in it. It has to be this one..
They opened the box without much effort and inside was the item they had been looking for.. But one thing wasn't right: it wasn't green. This egg had a deep purple colour. Strange. Maybe the sources weren't right? The last dragon egg had to be green. Could it be the reason this egg was in such an unusual location, because no one knew about it? They rapidly took the egg out of its container, put it in a leather case and hurried towards the exit.

With their magic they scanned the room and came to the startling discovery that there was an enormous amount of soldiers between them and their way out. So stupid.. We wanted the egg so much, that we didn't think of our own safety.. In an attempt to flee to the exit they followed their personal guide. It seemed like the soldiers had not noticed them yet, and encouraged by this fact they ran even faster..

And that was when everything went wrong..

An arrow whooshed through the air and hit Vreth in the back. He screamed, and Arwýn looked around her, alarmed.
"Vreth! Vreth, no! This isn't happening!" His face was filled with pain, yet he managed to look at her.
"Arwýn.. you have to go.. You have to make sure... that the last... egg is safe.. It is the most important... part of our task."
"No, Vreth, don't leave me! Please, I can't do this on my own!"
His hand reached for her face and gently caressed her cheek. "I know you can do this. You have to.. please.. for me.." He collapsed, and turned pale.
Arwýn fell to the floor next to him and began to cling to his tunic, no clue what to do. She placed her finger to his throat and her heart broke into a thousand pieces when she could not feel his heartbeat. For the last time she caressed his shiny silver hair and for the last time she looked at his beautiful dark eyes before she closed them.

She awoke with a start when she saw sudden movements and realised she was surrounded by many, many soldiers. So far our good plan..
Led by despair, she grabbed the purple dragon egg, the most secret object in all of Alagaësia, and she directed all her energy and concentration to the spell she was going to cast. She raised the egg up in the air and murmured a long, complicated spell in the Ancient Language. A blue flash lit the room, and the soldiers were blinded for a short period of time.
Exhausted, Arwýn dropped to the floor, and smiled. She had sent the egg to the west of the country, deep into the woods, exactly where she wanted it to be. Then everything turned into a deep, black hole.