Author's Note: Okay…sooohoho it's been a long while. I was reading the latest update of Kipper Bird's critical analysis of Inheritance Cycle. (If you like Inheritance Cycle, it might make you unhappy, but it might also entertain you as well.) Anyways, they were covering the scene where Nasuada meets Galby for the first time. So this of course made me think of the Ra'zac. Naturally.

This fic takes place primarily in the Hall of the Soothsayer. Now I did some research so I know my interpretation of events is going to be wrong-ish. But imagine if in part, Galby's reference to people resting on the stone becoming Soothsayers, was a sort of sick joke, as in anyone tortured upon that rock was going to start talking really fast.

Mincemeats: I'm sorry for stealing your names for the Ra'zac, but you got those names stuck in my head. And I am doubly sorry for the following.

Disclaimer: I don't own. After this piece I should be PROHIBITED from writing about Ra'zac EVER again.


The Hall of the Soothsayer

"Do you know where we are Little Ones?" Mellifluous and silken, the king's voice flowed over the Ra'zac's ears, conjuring images of downy feathers and clear streams. But under his voice's gentleness caress something fey, dangerous, and carefully controlled, teased their instincts with its subtle warning.

His hands large, lethal, and gloved in black, rested idly upon their naked heads. The hands that had gently shepherded them into this room, clotted in gloom, hazed and steam, and decorated by strange colourful murals, had wielded magic powerful enough to destroy the Riders, butcher Ra'zac and Lethrblaka years before that, and bring the world to heel -those bloodied hands- now rested so unassumingly and softly upon them. Deceitful.

They could almost forget that he'd ever had part in such a brutal history. More than that they could almost forgive him his role. But the Human King, standing dark and foreboding over them cloaked in dragon hide, and smelling of soot and flame, looked like a vision from their nightmares. And they cringed at his soft touch.

A raspy click of uncertainty escaped the smaller Ra'zac's beak. The wrong answer could be just as deadly as the right one. The gamble: weighing the odds against each other, was always the most terrifying part. And she glanced at her bother to see if he she was faring better than she.

Thins wisps of steam curled at their feet as they considered the weight of their answers. And slowly Guile larger opened his beak, only to close it with a snap, as the fainting clinking of chains and a faint shuddering breath cut through his thoughts.

His voice caught in his throat as his fell upon a Human woman, blindfolded and gagged, held against a block of stone by cruel chains. Stale fear clung to her in the form of drying perspiration. The smell would have normally tantalized his senses. He was a predator by nature, and prey was prey, but this. This… it was wrong and the sight of a bound human hanging to vulnerably at the mercy of his king, scared him.

The gloom clotting the rooms corners morphed into endless years of fear and torment and the red and blue whorls upon the ceiling and walls was congealed blood.

Guile's eyes returned to his feet. His voice had forsaken him. And even if it had not, he would not have given name to this place.

An arm's length away Glint trembled, eyes riveted to the large stone in the centre of the room. Guile worried for her. Always he had been the one to protect her, and his voice would not work. He could not force the words trapped painfully in his neck to move passed his teeth.

"I don't know Sire."

Faint and hollow, underlined by a faint hiss, his sister at last dared to breach the brittle silence.

His sister swallowed and her wide eyes darted to him and then to the king, who stood as silent and as still as stone above them.

As gently as before the king nudged them deeper into the room, closer to the Human woman, chained upon the rock. Then he slipped from behind them, and the Ra'zac uttered a collective and silent sigh of relief, as his presence became less overbearing.

Terrible and dark, he slowly strode through the gloom, faint curls of steam, like dying ghosts, swirling about his feet. And for a minute the only sound was his ominous footfall, echoing upon the walls, and the quickening gasps of his prisoner as she sensed his approach.

"This place is called the Hall of the Soothsayer."

The prisoner utter a muffled whimper, but king paid her no heed, as he kept his ebony gaze upon his pair of young assassins.

"It is said that at one time the vapours could grant people insight into future events."

Uncomfortably the shorter Ra'zac shifted, suspicious of the very air.

"And this stone…." The King paused behind the rock, the very beginnings of a smirk curling his lip as the prisoner shifted uncomfortably. "They used to say that those who rested upon it would become soothsayers." Galbatorix trailed a finger down the prisoner's face, eliciting a muffled cry as she blanched and bucked, struggling against the chains that held her.

The shorter Ra'zac glanced away, and her fingers slid into her brother's hand, but a painful squeeze from her brother forced her gaze upon the king. They were supposed to see this. The King wanted them to see this.

"If one believes in such things."

Galbatorix's finger fell away from the woman's face, and his dark eyes looked over the Ra'zac's heads, and it took all their will power not to turn around, as the doors of the Hall opened.

Carts arrayed with a plethora instruments that made Guile's stomach twist with violent horror were wheeled in and stationed on either side of the prisoner. He bit upon his tongue, willing the acrid taste of bile from the back of his throat. Meat cleavers, scalpels, knives, canisters of some sort of liquid, and other implements he couldn't begin to guess the purpose of glinted with cruel mockery in the Hall's wan light.

Undaunted and unconcerned, the slaves bowed before their king, sweeping passed them with expressionless faces. The door closed, and from beyond the heavy wooden barriers the Ra'zac could hear their joking banter as they resumed whatever conversation they'd paused upon entering.

True shock unfurled in the Ra'zac. How? How could the slaves be so callous? Beside him his sister shivered.

"Guile, I want to go home." The words spoken in their language were little more than a whispered hiss. And wholeheartedly he wished to bolt as well. But they could not, and instead he gripped her shelled ebony hand all the more firmly.

"This one here," the king fiddled with a gadget on one of the trays, as he eyed the cowering prisoner. "Is a spy. She was working in the service of that terrorist Brom."

Immediately the prisoner reacted. She writhed and twisted, shouting and sobbing into her gag, scraping the skin from her wrists.

"She has not been very forthcoming with her information. And I thought perhaps, something more innately terrifying, like man-eating…predators such as yourselves, might loosen her tongue. Then again, perhaps not. She did prophesize her own demise." The King frowned at the quieting spy.

"Your exact words were 'you'd rather be eaten' were they not?"

At that the prisoner stilled entirely, but nothing in her countenance suggested submission. Instead it seemed to Guile that she was seething. And he though he saw a fleeting flicker of admiration in Glint's eyes.

"Though I'm positive you were referring to darling Shruikan, I suspect a pair of young Ra'zac will eat you just as readily." With a flicker of irritation Galbatorix set the contraption down, and gloomily he approached the twins.

His full attention, and that dark piercing gaze, flickering unbridled rage at his prisoner's silence, made the Ra'zac quail.

"This," The king gestured to the carts of equipment, "is the start of your training."

Cold and sick with dread and horror, two pairs of large hematite eyes fell upon the collection torture apparatus.

"Begin," Galbatorix commanded as he slipped passed them. The Ra'zac felt him move toward the door, but he did not leave, and the soft scrape of fabric upon stone suggested that the king had found a comfortable place to observe the proceedings.

"Every enemy has a weakness. One that can be exploited, and hung over their heads, forever. You must find hers. You must find hers, before she finds yours. One day I will need you to track down my enemies, taking vital intelligence from them, and they won't be blindfolded, gagged, and subdued. They will be vicious. They will be armed with metal-and with magic. They will be Elves, Dragon Riders, Urgals, Dwarves, Humans-enemies all of them-every single one of them seeking to kill you. You must know how to gut and hamstring them before ever you meet them or you will surely fail. The two of you must learn to make them suffer, or they will see that you suffer."

Guile's flesh crawled beneath his carapace. It was horrible enough, just thinking of torture, but knowing that there was an audience watching every move he and his sister made was terribly uncomfortable. Assassination was like hunting, or so he'd always thought, but this….

Slowly his sister slipped from his arms, and shuffled to the nearer of the two carts. Wide eyed she peered down at the utensils, and her hand trembled as it hovered over them. From where he stood rooted to the floor, the larger Ra'zac could hear her teeth creaking as she clenched her jaw, a film of tears threatening to spill.

Her hand shivered violently as she looked back at him, back at the king, frozen, as she teetered upon a narrow line. Beseeching, pleading, begging, for help, for an escape route, or maybe for something else entirely she looked back to her brother. She couldn't do it. Neither of them could. Killing to feed, killing to defend, those she could understand, but inflicting wanton suffering upon another living being for a few words was wrong. It was so wrong.

Internally she screamed for her parents. But they couldn't hear her, and she didn't dare protest out loud. So she stood, as the entire room started to quake, and she secretly prayed the ground cracked beneath their feet and swallowed them all.

"Glint. Guile. Do you need gilded invitations?" The king's voice slipped over them, edged with the first traces of irritation.

Glint's trembling grew worse, her hand jerking as terrified wracked her body. She couldn't do it. She couldn't. She looked to Guile standing like a statue less than a yard away, eyes blown wide with fear as he gaped at her.

She couldn't do it. He couldn't do it either, and their inaction would be the death of them.

Glint's hand fell to her side as pent up sobs whistled through her teeth.

"Guile," she rasped, unable to look at him.

Chains clinked, and the prisoner stirred, her movements ignored by the Ra'zac.

"Know that I am expecting you to fail. If this were an easy task everybody would do it, but you're mine. You're very existence in this world, is to see your people ruling the midnight sky is it not? What is the life of one spy next to the continued existence of your kind…?" Again the king's honeyed voice swept over them, reassuring, patient, and gentle.

Guile frowned, imagining his parents, disappointed and enraged at them both, seeing him frozen and Glint standing there unable to lift a knife. Failures. They both were. What was the life of one measly human compared to theirs? A human that sure would have happily seen them killed if their positions had been reversed? The king had spoken absolute truth, and still he couldn't move.

"Perhaps I should have started by teaching the two of your own weaknesses…?" The king's voice was still melodious and soft, but something in it made Guile incredibly nervous. With widened eyes and mouth open he understood.

Before him Glint fell nearly still.

Her heart hammered with painful ferocity in her chest, as she imagined her brother strung to that rock- being forced to do that to her brother-it made her head reel and her breaths become ragged pants. She reached out to grasp the cart, fearing that she'd faint.

Weaknesses…the word rang cruel and mocking in Guile's head. Odium, foul, and intoxicating flowing through his veins, as he saw the underlying threat in the King's words. What he was implying he could do. And it sickened him.

Never in his life had Guile hated anyone more than he hated the king in that instant, and with red stained vision, he looked to the trays wondering if he might have been able to had put a knife His Majesty's eye.

Before Glint's eyes the knives glinted dully, as she supported herself upon the tray. Their dull blades winking knowing, and every sing weapon before her, seemed to hum with eager anticipation of her next move. Each one begged to used, and her hand rose, only to clap against the cart in a wave of nausea.

She could do it! She could inflict pain upon someone without killing them! Of course she could! Anything to spare her brother. That she could never do. Her clawed fingers dug into the lip of the cart, as her arms trembled, and something dangerous and maniacal filled the eyes of her reflected images.

She could do it!

Her arms wouldn't budge and she broke into another wave of sobs as her body failed her.

Then she heard a whoosh and a muffled scream. It cut through all thought and feeling. Glint whirled toward the prisoner wide eyed and trembling-

Crimson blood flecked and dribbled along Guile's spiny hand, and he stood frozen, hand clenched and trembling around the handle of a knife buried to the hilt in soft pale flesh. Red flowed from the wound he'd made, smelling sweet against the bile in his throat.

All there was in the world was flowing blood, his heart thudding in his head, his hatred, and the terrible sound of applause echoing in sharp claps around the room.

It was the prisoner's writhing and gasping that slowly brought him to. Tears dribbled from beneath the blindfold, down cheeks that had once been red with fury. Now they were a ghastly white.

Cold and shaking Guile released the knife and he stared numbly at the pained twitches of the prisoner. He turned back at Glint, the stunned scared expression still resting on her face.

Revulsion seeped its harrowing way into every fibre of his body. Ill-used, terrible, disgusting, he had just become the monster Humans had always accused the Ra'zac of being. And his sister had witnessed it.

"I'm sorry," he clucked softly to her softly, afraid Galbatorix would hear. He blinked the hot blurriness out of his eyes, and looked away from all of the room's occupants.

"Not bad for a first attempt."

Fabric swished and scraped over stone, and the room was filled only the prisoner whimpering and gasping like a fish, and heavy tread of large boots over stone.

Guile tried to shrink into himself as the king stopped beside him. Behind him he heard a softer series of footfalls, and he felt Glint at his back, clinging to him. His fingers found hers, but still the Ra'zac refused to lift his head and acknowledge anything other than the mist curling at his feet.

"The wound will kill her. Too swiftly I'm afraid," the king mused as he stopped before the prisoner. She whined and pulled feebly against her bonds. "Still, your strike was, marvellously fluid and you should be commended for that. But the aim here is to inflict pain not death. You want her to talk. So-" Galbatorix plucked the knife from the prisoner's body, and the prisoner keened into her gag tugging at the viciously strong chains that held her- "you'll have to do better."

"Guile take your knife back."

Wordlessly Guile took the knife from the king's hand.

"Glint ungag our friend if you will."

The Ra'zac jerked, and hastened to do as Galbatorix wished, before darting back to her brother's side.

Every hiss of pain whistling through the prisoner's teeth was audible and loud, punctuated by the soft clinking of the chains as she trembled and breathed.

"Come forward Little One," the king urged softly. He took Guile by the shoulder, and gently ushered him before the prisoner. The knife shook in the Ra'zac's grip as he was forced to confront the prisoner. Harder he stared at the floor, wishing that he couldn't hear the prisoner's breathing, that she had fallen unconscious, or that she would die. He wanted her suffering to end, and to have had no part in it from the start.

And he wondered how upset the king would be if drove the knife right into her heart-and ended it all right then. But he feared what Galbatorix would do him, and even more he feared what he would do to Glint for such a display of mercy.

"Now let's try this again."

Guile's heart pounded in his throat, dizzying and loud, as the king wrapped a gloved hand around his. A wave of sickening dread washed over him, as the blade's cruel blood stained tip rose upward.

"No-!" The word was out before he could help himself; morphing into a frightful hiss as he panicked and desperately tried to yank himself free of the King's hold.

"Sssire there must be another way!" His words gave way to sobs and frantic chittering in his native tongue as he begged and pleaded for Galbatorix to stop.

The Ra'zac squirmed and fought, desperate to escape. The King was mad! The King was evil! And Guile just wanted to get away, consequences be damned.

Behind him Glint was sobbing and screaming, her frantic words lost to him as they blended into the roar of pulsing blood in his ears.

But nothing changed. Guile's protests did nothing. Galbatorix was in one of those moods, beyond the point of reason or care. And the knife continued to move forward, until it settled upon the prisoner's belly.

"I DON'T WANT TO-!" Guile screamed.

"LET HIM GO!"

Glint launched herself forward, and the sudden Guile was shoved aside. The knife clattered to the floor. A dark fist sent Glint sprawling to the floor. She laid there, stunned, fearful sobs reduced to shocked pain filled gasps, before slowly curling upon herself and trembling.

Hunched against the block Guile crouched and trembled, shock and fear punching shallow pants through his teeth, as a cold horror settled painfully in the Ra'zac's chest. Above him the King stood, tall, immovable, and dangerous. All good humour had vanished, replaced by a scowl as the king stared down at his sister with a fury Guile had never seen before.

The silence that followed was deafening, and settled upon the room, stifling and suffocating, every moment becoming an agonizing torture in its own right.

Guile prayed for the king to leave his sister alone, and prayed that she would not move or say anything. Because there was a tension in the king's shoulders. There was something lethal and deathly patient in his posture, that suggested he was waiting for an excuse, any excuse to do what-Guile didn't want to guess.

Please don't….

It was the prisoner who broke the silence.

"They're children. And it speaks of your own craven perversion using them to do your dirty work."

For a moment the strain of the wound Guile had inflicted seemed to sap her ability to speak. Chains clinked softly, and her head tilted. Or perhaps more likely she felt the ominous pressure of Galbatorix's attention falling upon her.

"Kids-kids… do as your lord commands, and spare yourselves a bit of grief. I'm dead." A sardonic smile touched the woman's lips. "The moment I chose to be a spy I died. It's the reality of the life I chose, and it does no one any good to drag this out. It's alright. Go ahead and pick that knife up. There's nothing that you can do, that I have not prepared for. It'll be okay."

Guile choked on the dread and tears clogging his throat. The prisoner's sympathy only made it worse. He would have rather she called him a monster, or raved about how his kind deserved to be extinct, anything other than pity. He didn't want it. It licked warmly at his frayed nerves, stirring shreds of gratitude, leaving him confused, and he hurt all the worse for it. He protectively cinched his arms around his torso as fresh tears, hot and stinging, escaped his eyes.

Everything that had transpired since entering the room was crushing him.

"Pick up the knife." The King's voice was colder than winter, but his ebony eyes blazed with a cruel dark fire as he glared at his gaunt blindfolded prisoner wasting away in her chains.

Without a word Guile stooped for the knife, refusing to speak, afraid that he'd spill the churning contents of his stomach on the floor. Gingerly he pushed the blade into the outstretched hand waiting for him.

The gloved fingers captured his in a vice, and a strangled noise of fear and disbelief punched through his teeth as he bit back a shriek.

It would get him nowhere. And he didn't dare risk Glint getting involved a second time. Though from the sound of her muffled crying she was presently subdued.

Disgusted, angry, and horrified his fingers went limp in the king's grasp. He wanted no part in this. This wasn't hunting. This wasn't death. No. This was evil. And he blinked away tears as the grip on his hand shifted, holding him more securely.

The knife rose, and the Ra'zac hurled. The gruesome stinking remnants of a previous meal staining the floor.

Fabric tore under the unyielding firmness of the king's hand. Guile's hand. The Ra'zac trembled, one arm cinched tight around his heaving narrow chest as though he was one being cut.

Beneath the cruel blade, the prisoner twitched and blanched, sobbing and crying out, and he was powerless to stop it.

Fibres that caught along the blade only added to the prisoner's discomfort, and Guile silently cried under the oppressive weight of the king's malicious glee.

While Galbatorix guided the knife and the Ra'zac's hand he interrogated the prisoner. Every question was punctuated by a twist of the blade or the deepening of a previously made wound. But the prisoner refused to utter a word. Not a scrap of information she yielded, nor did she beg for any reprieve. And Guile wished that she would. Anything to end it.

Please….

Behind him Glint had started speaking, her voice tinged with wrath and thick with tears, directed at whom or at what Guile didn't care. He couldn't understand her. Something horrible and evil and sick was crushing him, and he couldn't breathe. All he wanted was to flee, to cuddle into his parents' wings, safe inside Helgrind with his sister.

Mercifully his hand was released, he knife wrenched from his grasp, and Guile staggered back.

Glint moved, wrapping her arms about around trembling brother, and pulling away from their sadistic master. Her brother, so fierce and brave, uttered a shaky breathless sob as he buried his face in her chest.

All the tighter she held him, glaring at the king's back and then at the prisoner, unsure who in that moment she hated more. She wanted to kill. She wanted to kill them both, for hurting brother so. She wanted to tear them apart, leave them both ruined on the floor, and then slake her beak in their blood.

But she would be a fool to even dare attacking the king. He'd kill her, or kill her brother out of spite, and Guile had suffered enough. Fiery and glittering with tumultuous rage her eyes fell on the prisoner, even as the king clapped the flat of the knife against her cheek.

"I told you reticence would not avail you. I would have been merciful if you had answered my questions. There would never have been a need for this if you had spoken." The knife dragged along the prisoner's cheek, drawing blood, and a pained hiss.

"If you won't speak, there are prisoners who will. And as you prophesized, these two will dine upon you-"

"Let them," the prisoner sneered with cold venom, before spitting in the king's face.

In spite of her hatred Glint smiled in admiration.

"Let them you sadistic-"

Blood bloomed bright red, filling the room with is scent, as the tender artery in the prisoner's throat was cruelly severed. Pausing to clean the blade on the dying prisoner's tunic, the King turned Glint and her brother.

Guile had fallen still, horribly still, and terribly rigid in her arms, now stirred as if feeling Galbatorix's gaze.

With onyx eyes he appraised them, before looking toward the door. And Glint felt her pulse slow as she sensed escape. They were free, done with this horrible situation. They'd seen. They'd learned. And she gave her brother's hand a silently joyful squeeze.

"Next!"

The King's voice fell upon her like lead slabs. Guile's head shot up, and the twins exchange horrified glances.

"Next?" Glint asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

Malign glee glittered in the King's eye, and the hint of a smirk quirked his lips. "You're lesson is far from over. Neither one of you has passed." The sound of the door opening cut the King off, and three pairs of eyes looked to see a pair of soldiers hauling in another prisoner: a man, scruffy and thin, blindfolded like the woman before him.

In her arms Guile uttered plaintive hiss. "Please not another one."

Reflexively Glint clung to him tighter, trying to convey through touch alone that she was there, and nothing would happen to him, and she loved him, and she'd protect him, and everything would end alright.

"Throw her over there." The king gestured to a corner of the room, as the guards removed the corpse from the rock. "She's for my darling Ra'zac if and when they decide to eat."

"Try again." The King commanded. "And this time Glint, I expect you to participate."

Galbatorix slowly backed away from the Ra'zac, giving them a chance to manage on their own. Inflicting pain while denying death… it was a simple enough thing. There was something sublime, holding another's life in the palm of one's hand. There was nothing so empowering as the ability to wield pain and pleasure. And he smiled, in anticipation of the moment they became aware of that simple fact. How bright those dark wide eyes would be in their hideous little faces. And true monsters they would. Inside he laughed. So long they had fought against the reality of what they were. Even now their parents sought to shield them from the truth.

They were monsters. His monsters. It was their inherent nature. Irreconcilable and irredeemable.

His little bringers of death, bent to his will, tethered to his desires by their 'love' for each other, if it could be called that, and obedient in all things. This lesson was more than training. It was the first step in their conditioning. They would be broken and completely his when all was said and done.

"It's not so hard," he crooned. "It's like painting, but the only colour I've given you is red. It's a work of art both visual and auditory. As the woman said. They're already dead. I trust the two of you have played with your food on occasion? This is no different."

It was different. The deceptive gentleness Galbatorix spoke with did little to eradicate the inherent wrongness of the situation, even if it dulled their nerves. With clearer eyes, but darkened mind Guile frowned nervously at his sister, before shuddering and looked away with a choked sob. He couldn't do it. Not again.

It didn't matter what one prisoner said. It wasn't okay.

Even as they stood; Glint staring at her brother in horrified silence, unable to do a thing for him, and Guile slowly breaking in a deluge of choked breathless sobs and wheezes, the air about seemed to thicken and cool with peril.

Neither needed to look behind them to know the King was a hairsbreadth from losing his patience. Again. She absently started to raise a hand to her beak, where one of her teeth now sat loose in its socket, only to lower it with a scowl. She wouldn't degrade herself further by letting him know of the damage he'd inflicted.

Her mood was stormy, and her eyes held a tempest of tumultuous fury, hate, anger, fear, and compassion. Something between a growl and a hiss shuddered up from her lungs, roiling long and lethal through her teeth as she felt the danger in the room growing more pronounced.

Guile was hurt. It was the single thought that solidified at the forefront of her mind. Yes she would lose a few teeth, and sport of some cracks in her carapace, but none of that was near the agony of what her brother had gone through.

She sensed the last few seconds of time slipping from them.

"How do I ssstart?" She swallowed as the prisoner on the rock wriggled. Beside her, arms clenched tightly about himself, her brother's head shifted minutely, and she suspected he was watching her without trying to see her or the prisoner.

"You just have to start." The King's voice smiled at them mockingly. And Glint easily imagined his hideous smirk. "It gets easier after that."


I want it to be known I fail. I'm a fop-writer. I chickened out, and couldn't bring myself to complete this. It got to be too much, and I just couldn't do it. There's actually a reason why this takes place in the Hall of the Soothsayer. It wasn't just coincidence. But I got way too uncomfortable to continue. I might try to pick this up where I left off, some day, just to bring it to the ending that it was supposed to have, but as of right now I'm leaving it at the wonderful little line by Galby.

If you want to know where this was headed:

1. Galby was going to make good on his threat in-spite of their cooperation, and have the Ra'zac chained to the rock consecutively ((and I think you could see where this is headed)) while the other put all they had learned to practice on their sibling.

2. Guile would pass out during his stint on the rock, and he'd see his own death years later, but not Glint's. As such he would always hold out hope for her survival.

3. There would be an interlude in Carvahall where Guile is reflecting on all of this, as well as shedding light on how the Lethrblaka reacted seeing their pupae scarred and changed by Galbatorix's 'lessons.' Especially since the King has already killed some of the Lethrbalaka's previous children and stolen previous clutches of eggs and sent them off to the Priests.

4. All of the above-the torture of the prisoners, the visions, and the Carvahall scene, would all turn out to be memories, as Guile curses Eragon and faces the end he had seen coming all along.