12/11/101-?

The rest of the journey was spent in a restless, magical doze and constant bouts of agonizing, ceaseless pain as the Twins alternated between keeping him asleep and torturing him. Murtagh was helpless to do anything about it, as he had no magic with which to counter with and his hands and feet were always tightly bound.

He shifted, locked into agitated rest. His dreams during his forced sleeps showed him his memories in a blurry cycle, changing constantly from subject to subject. Sometimes, he saw Selena, what he remembered of her—a beautiful, worn face who eyes always seemed to contain some indescribable sorrow. Sometimes, it was Morzan, and the blade of Zar'roc flashing as the Forsworn threw it in a drunken rage. More often, though, it was Eragon and Saphira—the day they met, the day Saphira threatened to bash sense into both of them, the day he entered the Varden. The day of the battle.

What happened to Ajihad? he thought muzzily. And what of the Varden now?

A burning hand reached into his mind, tearing his dreams away. Murtagh jerked awake with a gasp, the veil of sleep firmly removed. This wasn't Twin work; they liked to keep him partially asleep even in torture. No, this was much clearer—he felt more alert than he had in a long, long time.

He sat up awkwardly—his hands were still bound behind him. It was dark where he was and smelled faintly of mold. Bracing his hands against a wall behind him, he stumbled to his feet, eyes adjusting slowly to the darkness.

"You needn't bother," a voice said. "You won't need much for light anyway."

Murtagh froze. He knew that voice. There was the light pad of footsteps, then it purred, very close to his ear, "Welcome back, Murtagh."

In the gloom Murtagh could just very barely make out Galbatorix's face, cold and handsome in its elven-like glory. "You," he said in reply, forcing himself to keep his voice even.

Galbatorix punched him in the darkness, sending him sprawling across the floor. "Murtagh," the emperor said tightly, any attempt at cordiality lost. "You really didn't think you could hide forever, did you? Skulking around, trying to sneak out of my city…well, you may have succeeded once, but you will never do it again." A boot lashed out, striking Murtagh in the ribs. "And I'll make sure you regret the time you did."

He raised his hands. Murtagh drew a quick breath, feeling a horrible anticipation run down his spine. Galbatorix grinned at him, teeth flashing in the gloom. "Not so brave now? Maybe if you're very good after this, I will never do it again."

Bright, grotesquely colorful magic flashed from Galbatorix's hands, enveloping Murtagh in a blanket of rippling, destroying pain. Murtagh was lost in it, drowning within it, forgetting that anything existed outside of it. He might have been screaming, he wasn't sure—all his senses were lost to him, lost in that terrible burning power.

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He couldn't remember. Couldn't think, couldn't gather his thoughts long enough together. The pain was inside him in a thousand forms—eating, burning at him as an acid, crushing him, cutting him—he was begging, crying, with all the dignity of a beggar on the streets, helpless and hopeless and willing to do anything to end it.

It seemed to be an eternity, stretching on forever without a visible end. But it did end, eventually, fading away to leave him weak and ruined on a filthy cell floor. Galbatorix was gone, but the pain remained.

It came in other forms then, inflicted not by magic, but by fire and whip and the beatings of men. They came irregularly, sometimes two of them in a single day, while the time between others would stretch for many days, leaving him wracked with fear as to when they would begin next.

Dignity was gone, as was his years of discipline in the school of control and restraint. He fought when he could, straining against his chains, but those moments were few and far in between as the torture continued, breaking him.

He cried sometimes, when he had the tears to spare. Nobody was around to hear, and he didn't have the willpower to fight anymore. It was replaced with a flood of sick, tired despair and overwhelming fear.

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1/20/101

"Murtagh," Galbatorix greeted coolly. "How has our hospitality been?"

Murtagh didn't answer, unable to gather up the courage to do so. Pain blazed from every inch of his body, distracting him, making it hard to think.

He flinched in fear as Galbatorix laid an icy hand on his cheek gently, mockingly. "Are you willing to serve me now, Murtagh? Have I taught you correctly?" He leaned forward, eyes gleaming. "Your father, Morzan, was the most faithful of my men. I trust you shall be the same?"

Galbatorix's fingers reached down, tracing the pattern of bruises and blood on Murtagh's chest. "You won't forget this lesson, will you, Murtagh?" His voice was mild, amused. "Running away from me wasn't a very good idea." His fingers tightened in the skin, fingering an edge of a half-healed wound.

The prisoner gasped as the movement caused broken bones to grate upon themselves, his breath catching in his throat. Galbatorix laughed, the sound cold and vicious. "I thought as much." He let go of the wound, laying a fatherly hand on Murtagh's shoulder. "It hurts, doesn't it?" he said, his voice low and melodic. "My gift to you, Murtagh, if you should serve me willingly."

Without any sort of audible prompting, gray fire began to flow from Galbatorix's hands, sliding greasily down Murtagh's skin. It sank into his body, stitching the whip marks closed, healing the brands and burns, melding the bones back together. The whole process took barely a minute, and Galbatorix was serenely calm at the end of it. "How is that?" he whispered, brushing Murtagh's filthy, blood-caked hair from his forehead. "Much better?"

Murtagh's breath caught in his throat. Yes, the pain was gone, only to be replaced by a sick, violent fear, so much as to be nausea. Cool fingers touched his throat, and the urge to puke faded. The fear, however, did not. "I—"

He stopped, not daring to meet Galbatorix's eyes. The emperor laughed, and it was not a pleasant sound to hear. "Go on," he said quietly. "I like to hear the opinions of my servants."

Murtagh closed his eyes, keeping his head lowered, healed fingers clenched tightly. Finally, in a ragged whisper, he said, "What use am I to you? I'm a fair swordsman, but—there must be others like me. I have no magic—what do you want me for, besides revenge?"

"That is where you are mistaken, son of my friend," he said softly. "I'll tell you, shall I? First, I do not like loose ends. I do not like rebels, either, and you, my dear, are the perfect example of both. I lost you once, and I intended to get you back. Second—" he crouched, meeting Murtagh's eyes levelly. "You can tell me about the Varden, and your little friend Eragon. He's also a very nice example of a loose end and a rebel, and I can clean him up soon enough. Third—" he laughed. "I'll tell you later, I think. I'll enjoy it. But first—as is the rule, if I tell you something, you must tell me something too. Information exchange; it's only fair."

Without warning—

Galbatorix's mind slammed into Murtagh's violently. Frantically, instinctively, Murtagh threw up barriers, trying to defend himself from the vicious, unrelenting assault. Galbatorix's laugh echoed in his mind—the emperor was amused, laughing as he flicked the barriers away—

I do love a challenge, you know, his voice said calmly. I haven't had such fun in months!

Bit by bit, inch by inch, Galbatorix forced his way in. Things were pried out—Eragon, Arya, Brom, their time in Gil'ead, the Varden, his childhood, anything, everything, pulled out against his will. Murtagh's life was laid bare under Galbatorix's scrutiny; not a single inch went unexamined. Tears ran down his face as he remembered bitter memories he had struggled to bury, painful things that were meant to be private—NO!

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He must've fainted, for the next thing he was aware of was that he was lying on a bed, the first bed he had been in for what seemed like eternity. Sitting up slowly, he saw Galbatorix standing over him. "Eragon is protected," the king said lightly. "It seems that the images you have provided me with aren't enough to scry him."

Murtagh couldn't find anything to say. Finally, he managed softly, "Oh."

"Fortunately," the king said, pacing around him, "I have you." He turned around, eyes gleaming. Within his arms, he held a chest. Murmuring a word, he clicked the chest open.

Within lay two gleaming eggs—one emerald, and the other ruby. Murtagh stared at them, momentarily stunned. "The last two dragon eggs," he said finally.

"There would be three, but Brom and his little friend happened to steal the other," Galbatorix said conversationally. "It made me most vexed, and so I'm glad Brom's dead. Jeod…well, I don't know exactly where he is, but I'll find him soon." He glanced at Murtagh, a half-smile on his face. "Now's a good time to tell you reason number three."

"You don't know that," Murtagh whispered in horror, guessing what it was by the smug expression on Galbatorix's face. "My mother wasn't a Rider."

"She could've been," Galbotorix shrugged. "Pity she wasn't, but it doesn't matter. Your brother's blood cancels it all out, Murtagh."

"My brother?" Murtagh said, frowning slightly. "I don't have a—"

"Eragon."

Shock filled Murtagh's face, and his mind flashed back to the memories of what seemed so long ago. Eragon…his brother. Gods, how? How?

They hadn't spoken about their pasts…and Selena had vanished, making it perfectly plausible that Eragon be his brother. Murtagh reeled, lurching against the wall. "No!" he cried, a wild animal sound.

"No?" Galbatorix inquired.

"That can't be true, and you know it! You're lying—I—I—" Murtagh looked down at his hands, thoughts dancing madly through his head. Finally, he said, "I'll never work for you. I'll run away to the Varden—I can't, it can't be—"

"The Varden? My first horde of Urgals didn't work it, which is rather disappointing, especially after my Shade got killed. It rather annoyed me, you know. Still, if at first you don't succeed, try, try, again, right? So really, you haven't got much to run away to. If you can find your brother, he'll either be dead or else converted. Not much choice there, either. And Murtagh, it's perfectly possible. Eragon's mother is Selena, as is yours. You are a Rider, or will be…and of course, you will be loyal to me." He smiled, his hands deftly handling the eggs, watching Murtagh's expression with a widening smile. "Won't you?"

Galbatorix closed the chest carefully and set it down on a table. Raising his hands once more, he barked, "Malthinae!"

Murtagh fell back onto the bed, held in place by invisible chains. Galbatorix eyed the prone man, frozen into stillness. He resumed pacing, talking lazily. "The ancient language is vastly powerful, if you hadn't gathered that already, my dear. Everything can be named in it, including people…and there are ways to find out those names." He laughed. "Let's see, shall we? Eyddr eyreya myder!"

Murtagh fell into a semi-conscious haze, a blank arena in which nothing existed. It was darker than night, and his thoughts ceased to move…it was as if he were dead himself.

Sound seeped through slowly, echoing around the vast emptiness until they became a compelling order in which he had to obey. A set of words emerged slowly from the darkness, words of power. Murtagh struggled to hold them back, but the net of sound that was Galbatorix reached down effortlessly and plucked them from his grasp.

The darkness released him. Murtagh was thrown violently back into the harsh light of the dungeon, shivering and feeling as if he had just risen from death itself. Galbatorix's smug face filled his vision as the king threw a blanket at him. "Oh, cover yourself, you idiot," he said with a mirthless smile. "Or, should I say, Brikijae Knívarya?"

Though he had never heard those words in his life before, Murtagh recognized them instantly. The words hit him like a blow, a terrible flash of insight, laying bare his life. He screamed, fighting to hide from them, but they dug into his mind, steadily, relentlessly, forcing him into a part of mental torture that he didn't even know existed, because he was inflicting it upon himself. And he didn't know how to stop it, only by dying or insanity or—

And then it was over.

Murtagh staggered to the edge of the bed, retching again and again until he could bring up no more. He leaned against the bedpost, eyes closed, his face pale.

"Brikijae Knívarya?"

"Yes," Murtagh whispered. He knew those words, knew them from the very bottom of his soul. After all, it was his true name.

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End of Chapter Two

This is a revised version of the original chapter two, I added a torture scene and also changed…well, everything. Tell me how you think!

I'd reread the books, and I found somewhere that Brom said something about how knowing your true name is a scathing experience, but if you survive it, you're stronger. Or something like that. Anyway, I changed this chapter to reflect that experience, and hopefully got the feeling down.

I also felt that I didn't express the reasons for Murtagh's hatred and fear enough, and so that's why I added the torture scenes.

'Eyddr eyreya myder' means 'empty your mind'.

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