The Forsworn were generally assumed to be all dead. That was about as far from the truth as anyone could ever get.

There had been twenty-six in the original alliance. There were thirteen still left, four pairs, four dragons, and one former dragon rider. The rest had all been killed by a combination of Brom, the Varden, and the elves. Oh, and suicide by some of the dragons when their Riders died and vice versa. The only problem was that the remaining dragons were all male, which was obviously not a good thing, but that was a problem they could worry about later.

There had also been the Banishing of the Names, of course, and it should rightfully have driven all of the Forsworn mad, but the dragon Akai had remained unaffected in his speech. After a bit of investigation, the others figured out that it was because Akai didn't use proper language to communicate and, when his thoughts were translated into language, they were complete gibberish and made no sense. The other dragons and riders had had to muck their way through all that nonsense, and had, after months of effort, worked out that it simply could not be translated into any language. So the others dragons ditched that idea and one of them worked out that speaking in third person somehow also managed to shake off the effects of the spell, and the rest of the dragons followed suit. To talk about each other, they tricked their own minds into describing, instead of the actual dragon, and identical one except one that wasn't affected by the spell. They didn't really care why or how it did that; it worked, and that was that. No-one knew why the wild dragons had performed the act in the first place either, and there were hundreds of crazy theories that floated around the place, probably none of which were true.

Anyways, Hanso and Dorolea were one of the four pairs, and Shruikan and Galbatorix typically left them in charge of the Empire when they were gone. The Forsworn were scattered all over the place and neither Shruikan nor Galbatorix cared very much what they did as long it was fair and not illegal, but they had better come when they were called, on pain of getting shouted at if they got there a few days (or months, as the case might be) late. Galbatorix wasn't very creative or brutal with his punishments, and Shruikan thought it was so funny that he just let his rider keep doing that.

Luckily, Hanso and Dorolea were plenty more responsible than some of the others, and they turned up on the night they were called, leaving Shruikan and Galbatorix free to leave for the Burning Plains right away. Before leaving, Shruikan entrusted Dorolea with the wild dragon egg that Jill and Akai had somehow found in Du Weldenvarden, and Shruikan had told the blue dragon in confidence that if anything, and he meant anything, happened to that egg, there was going to be hell to pay when they got back. Shruikan's punishments were actually terrifying. Even Akai didn't dare get on the black dragon's bad side, and Akai was Akai.

It took Shruikan and Galbatorix maybe a few hours to get to the Burning Plains. Shruikan was a very old dragon, and very large as well; it didn't take him very long to get anywhere, especially not with Galbatorix giving him a magical speed boost.

There were a lot of shouts from below, and Shruikan hovered in the air above the camp for a few minutes to give everyone time to clear out of the way. He landed heavily, sending a few tents flying with the force from his wings, and Galbatorix got off.

Marc was at their sides almost immediately. He said, "Your Majesty! I wasn't expecting you to come here."

"We know," said Galbatorix. "Shruikan wanted to end the war a bit sooner than it would normally have taken. How is the army doing?"

"Fine, sire," said Marc. "I was planning on attacking the Varden early the next morning, and Dusk has given me quite a bit of valuable information regarding them."

"Oh? Like what?"

"They have three elves one their side, a magicians' guild, a cavalry unit let by the Surdan King Orrin, and fifty thousand men. She has also told me that nearly all of their supplies are coming from Surda, their host, and that the Varden have no idea what a strategy is. They have dwarf reinforcements on the way. Also, she doesn't know which side one of the elves is on, but I am going to treat him as an enemy until he gives me reason to believe differently."

Shruikan extended his mind out to the Varden camp. "Has she told you of the change in leadership?"

"Change in leadership?" asked Marc, alarmed.

"Relax, Marc," said Shruikan. "This change is in our favor. It seems that Ajihad and Jormundur were both assassinated earlier today, and they have chosen a winged boy as their new leader. Many of the Varden are unhappy and thinking of mutiny, but they seem to be ready to wait until the battle is over to rebel."

"They're letting a boy take command of the army?" said Marc.

"Apparently. Their memories of it are rather fuzzy, so I don't know the specifics." To only Galbatorix he added, "I would say that there's been a memory modification of everyone in the Varden, including the new leader."

"That's not possible! There are fifty thousand troops there, some of which are magicians. A memory modification of that scale..."

"I know, but all of them have the same memory, even though they shouldn't have all been standing in the same place during the new leader's speech. Their memories of the event are also patchy, and there are many holes scattered throughout. The specifics and exact wording of the speech are blurred. There is no way this is natural. I have my suspicions, but..."

"What?" Galbatorix caught something in Shruikan's thoughts and managed to have a good look at it before the dragon could throw it behind his mental walls. It was the voice of the one who had convinced them that Dusk was trustworthy.

"We don't know who she is," said Shruikan, "and yet we believed her. She must have nudged our minds in the right direction without us knowing. Something with that amount of power is beyond even us."

"You're right! Should we find her and put a stop to her?"

"No, I don't think we even could. Besides, we don't know her motivations right now. Even if she was the one to change the Varden's memories like that, then we still don't know why. She could be a potential ally for all we know."

"I don't like this."

"Neither do I, but what can we do about it? Let's concentrate on the battle for now. But I will warn the rest of the alliance to let them know."

Pigeon wandered through the Varden camp, doing his best to think of a strategy that would let them win and trying to ignore the hostile looks he was getting from many of the soldiers. The assassination had been very sudden, just like Pigeon's rise to leadership. In fact, he couldn't quite recall just how he had managed to get to the position of leader. He couldn't remember having ever wanted it, anyway.

He had owned a book on old battles before, but he couldn't remember anything in it now that he actually needed to. He ran his mind back through the battles he knew about where the outnumbered and outclassed armies had won. There had been the Revolutionary War, but that had been an entire war; there was that war between Texas and Mexico, but again, that was a war; there was that time when someone with a name starting with a C had defeated the entire Incan (or was it Aztec?) army with about ten people or something, but that was only because they had had horses and guns-

He started. Guns! That was it! Sure, he didn't know how to make a gun, exactly, but he did know how to make gunpowder and bombs. Sort of. They would explode, anyways, so they technically counted as bombs, even if they looked more like squashed bananas.

He asked a passing soldier, "Hey, do you know where King Orrin is?"

"Over there somewhere," said the soldier, pointing.

"Thanks," said Pigeon, and hurried off in that direction.

King Orrin's tent wasn't too big. There were about four guards outside, and they stopped Pigeon.

"Who're you?" asked one.

"The new leader of the Varden," said Pigeon. "I don't know if you've heard yet, but if you haven't, then Ajihad and Jormundur were just assassinated this morning and they picked me as the new leader. Can I see King Orrin?"

"Oh, so you're the boy everyone's been hating on?" said another one. "Alright then." He pulled back the tent flap and called inside it, "Your Majesty! The Varden's new leader wants an audience with you!"

"Tell him to come in!"

"There you go then," said the guard, and ushered Pigeon in.

The inside of the tent had quite a bunch of tables covered in bottles and vials of weird liquids. King Orrin was poking a meteorite with a stick when Pigeon walked in. He turned.

"You're Pigeon?" he asked, looking him up and down. Pigeon nodded.

"Um, King Orrin, I heard you were good with chemicals and stuff, and I've got an idea that might let us win this battle," said Pigeon hurriedly.

"Really? What's your idea?"

"Do you know what a bomb is?" asked Pigeon. Orrin shook his head. "Oh, well, it's this thing that makes stuff explode. I was thinking of planting some around the camp."

"There's a plant that makes things explode?" asked Orrin, sounding way too excited.

"What? No, it's not a plant. I meant making a bunch of them and placing them around the camp. If the Empire's army steps on them, then they blow up," said Pigeon. He tried not to think about what would happen to all those people. They probably all had families at home, too. Parents and children and siblings and wives who would cry for them if they died. They all believed in their cause, all believed that the Varden was a terrorist group and the Empire (with a king!) was right. There was no reason for them to die. It wasn't right.

"Do you know how to make them?"

Pigeon tried to ignore the thoughts and answered Orrin. "Yeah, but can I use your chemicals for it?"

"Sure!"

Maybe there was a chance of winning this after all.

He tried not to think that winning would mean a hundred thousand people dead.

It didn't work.