TW: References to the graphic tragedy at Yazuac, though actual descriptions are kept as sparse as possible.

I am at a loss for what of the following events to explain and what to let lay.

For example, I spent a handful of the next weeks pacing around a frigid campsite; half mad with indecision and anxiety. I doubt any of these evenings could be of interest or consequence. But, in the same vein, not every memory I have shared thus far has had world-altering weight— very few, in fact. I confess that the most "impactful" moments of my life have not been incidents of great weight; rather they are the small, fragile, human moments between disasters.

One of my first evenings in those mythical mountains qualified as one such moment, though not one I would have ever expected.

I lounged within my ramshackle shelter; muscles tense as a hunted fox. We'd promised each other a dozen times to be civil, but I had no more faith in him than he had in me. His slow footfalls crunching the virgin snow and his labored breathing had dominated my awareness for a quarter-hour before I bothered to speak. "You're early."

"The weather turned faster than I expected it to." Brom steadied himself on his staff as he pulled off his hood. Even the thin moonlight filtering through the pines was enough to show a gleam of sweat on the balded crown of his head. "If I'd waited for our original time, I would be trudging back to Carvahall through a blizzard."

I hummed tunelessly. "Or you just wanted an excuse to keep me off balance."

He narrowed his eyes as if affronted; as if he cared at all what I believed. "I don't see why it can't be both."

"A happy accident then." I pinched the top page of the journal in my lap and tore it cleanly from its bindings. As much I wanted to irk the old man, we didn't have the luxury of bickering all night. "I've gone over every possible loophole I could think of, but a second pair of eyes couldn't hurt."

He accepted the paper but did not immediately scan it. "Would you be so kind as to favor an old man with a reading light?" The affected tone of fragile senility was almost too much to tolerate. I flicked a finger in response, and a thin strip of pinkish light materialized in the air between us. His eyes narrowed, part in warning and part in distrust. "Well, that was unnecessary."

"If you dislike my methods, you are free to make use of your own." I knew it was childish to use non-verbal magic for such a petty display, but I so rarely had opportunities to be petulant without dire consequences.

"An interesting position to take, when you're the one asking for my assistance—"

"To protect your son." Finally the old man flinched, if only from discomfort. "A fact that I expect you to keep in mind. Now, let's get this over with before the blizzard arrives and you're trapped in my camp until morning." Brom snorted and got to work. That his remaining in my company would be a highly undesirable circumstance was perhaps the only thing on which we agreed.

And, of course, that my —painstakingly crafted— anti-scrying wards were likely to be the only thing standing between me and a quick return to Uru'baen. The deadline for my next report to the king was measured in hours now; if we couldn't get a shield in place before Torix went looking for me, then we would all be in unfathomable danger. As I was not able to use magic myself to thwart Galbatorix's designs, I needed an equally capable and knowledgeable mage to cast my creation. And, since none are available, Brom will have to do.

Hush. He may look infirm, but he is still a classically trained rider; many of the thirteen underestimated him to their cost. Katana was itchier about this process than I was myself. She and I had discussed the subject endlessly for two days, but neither of us were pleased with the decision we'd reached.

I fought a smirk. I think that will be the next insult I offer him, "infirm". Oh yes, it has deliciously cruel connotations.

Lilly—

I can give you credit for it, if that's what you're worried about. I would never want to steal the spotlight!

A, "ruffled-purple-sour," wave of exasperation accompanied her next thought, I'd prefer to remain anonymous.

Brom cleared his throat and lowered the page to his lap. "It's a thorough piece of magic; I don't see any glaring holes in it. But, that in and of itself can be a weakness— a ward that allows nothing at all to pass through can easily exhaust and kill the caster."

I nodded, meeting his cool stare. "True enough. But, the fourth line should contain some provision to that—"

"I see it. To quote, 'deflect the…' what is an exact translation of this next word… 'way of knowing?' The phrasing is a bit obscure, don't you think?"

"It has to be. He has more resources than just scrying at his disposal. I need to be beyond more than his sight."

Brom wisely decided not to ask since I couldn't answer him anyway. "Then the only other problem is that you have grossly overestimated my reserves of power."

I sighed. "Not quite. I was hopeful of course, given your towering reputation, but I can't claim surprise. There are some limitations no amount of stubbornness can overcome." I stood and padded the dirt off my breeches. "There is a way to bolster your strength, but I'd hoped to avoid resorting to it."

Brom tensed, as ready as he ever was to strike me down. I knew he'd need only the flimsiest excuse to assuage any guilt for the deed (assuming he'd feel any in the first place). "Some dark sorcery of Galbatorix's?"

I gave him a poisonous glare as I untied my pack. "If acquiring power was that easy, he'd never have massacred the skulblakan." He and I both knew the unspeakable evil behind Torix's true strength. In my case, it was literally unutterable; where Brom's hesitance came from a surplus of caution and grief. My meaning transcended words as I gingerly lifted my partner's faceted, midnight jewel of a heart from her velveteen carrying bag. Katana was hot to the touch even in these frigid mountains and pulsed with a dark beauty. It paled in comparison to her radiance in life, but it was still the most enthralling sight in all the world to me; the other half of my soul.

Brom looked ill. Too many emotions crowded his lined face to make them out individually, but an infant could have seen the hateful implications. "He let you take one of them?" His voice was rough and low with disdain and discomfort.

I dropped any aloofness I'd managed to retain and made a sour face. Her eldunari rested into the crook of my right arm like my body was forged for the sole purpose of holding her; my left hand rested on my hip. "Katana and I have been bonded longer than Galbatorix has worn his crown— I'd be worse than useless without her. Even he, for all his infirmities, knows that much."

Unduly humble, but much appreciated. And thank you for not leveling that particular barb at Brom.

You are quite welcome for the first; I haven't entirely given up on the second.

Brom's expression of disapproval morphed into obvious and sincere contrition. Though, beneath it lingered something else; something petulant and yearning.

It was all I could do to turn away. If my time at Torix's side taught me anything, it was that a rider who had lost their partner and knew of the eldunari, yet did not have the keeping of their dragon's heart was one of the most miserable creatures in the world. That was a key (though little discussed) reason that Galbatorix's war could never truly end for Brom. Until he knew with certainty that his Saphira's heart was destroyed or safeguarded, he could never be at peace. Coincidentally, I was the last person on earth who knew what had become of her; though old oaths prevented me from uttering a word on the subject; even to her rider.

Dangerous grounds. Katana knew less on the subject than she would like. Still, she could sense the color and direction of my musings well enough. I would offer to help with the riddle that plagues you, but we're short on time.

Perhaps someday, you will. I cleared my throat and lowered myself back to a sitting position. "Katana has offered her assistance in fueling the spell."

"Is she not also bound in servitude?"

My jaw tightened. I managed to keep a civil, educator's tone as I explained, "She has sworn no oaths. Torix's oversight grew from the state of the Thirteen's dragons. Since they were no longer rational beings, Galbatorix fell out of the habit of considering them as their own entities." I laughed and added, "It helps too that Katana can no longer eat him."

As much as I would have enjoyed the opportunity, I worry his rotted carcass would have given me indigestion. She sent her words not only to me, but to our guest as well. It was this vulnerable position that we'd agonized over since we'd first set up camp. Riders (even the bastardized and sociopathic few that trained me) refrained from communicating directly with any dragon but their own. Only the most intimate of companions were exempted, which was obviously a level of closeness that Brom and I could never reach.

Brom froze from his knobbly knees to the tip of his hooked nose. I pretended not to notice the sun-spotted hand that dragged over his suddenly damp cheek. He found his voice and intoned gravely, "It is an honor to make your acquaintance, Katana."

His insistence on speaking his words aloud was interesting since we could now both speak to Katana directly. Is it just that he doesn't want to exclude me or presume to touch my thoughts? If my inference was correct, it was a gentlemanly detail of which I could only approve. Galbatorix had never hesitated to insert his raking, painful consciousness into my skull for any mundane purpose; even when we'd been on " decent " terms. The past four years or so I'd lived in near-constant terror of suddenly hosting him.

I don't expect ours to be a lasting companionship. Katana's approbation and fascination for the man was etched into every syllable. I make this concession to pride and privacy only to help my rider. I trust that "The Terror of the Forsworn" can at least do that much?

Brom smirked at her obvious scorn— a good humor he'd never shown me. "With your help, I believe I can." He paused a moment. "If you don't mind my saying so, the two of you are very well suited to one another."

Like dragon—

"Like rider." I nestled Katana more comfortably within my crossed legs. Each of my fingers rested on a different facet of her heart. A pity we didn't realize it until much later in our companionship.

Quit being dramatic and let Brom and I get to work.

I took her reply for affection and obliged.

My elder was a thorough magic user. He talked through the lines multiple times to find the most natural rhythm before he accepted any energy from Katana. Luckily, I always put extra care into the phonetic structure of my more complex workings; it was the best way to safeguard against mistakes of diction or memory. That combined with his bardic sense of flow and pacing made the task almost too easy to have proper weight. Once the casting began, it was the work of minutes.

We have decided to let the spell draw from my strength instead of yours.

I frowned. That wasn't our agreement—

But it is the wiser course; leave your body's reserve for emergencies. So long as we aren't facing Torix or worse, you won't be needing my resources.

If I find a way to strike at Torix, I'll need a lot more than just us.

Have you ever asked him? Katana very pointedly withdrew from Brom's mind after making this remark. He is one of the only forces in the land to ever give Galbatorix trouble.

My subsequent snort drew Brom's attention. He rolled his eyes as if he already regretted taking her bait. "Asked him what?"

"Katana believes you would be a good ally against Torix. I disagree."

This offended the old man far more than I believed reasonable. "If it has somehow escaped your notice, Lilleth, I am opposing the king," he hesitated all of half a moment before adding (with the most genteel condescension), "unlike some."

Every old agitation for this pain in my neck re-emerged with a vengeance. "Sorry, I forgot you had methods that didn't involve cucking your enemies and slaughtering the rest; some of us are trying to save lives."

"Like you saved hers?" A painful, frigid silence overtook the clearing. He was rosy with emotions that I'd expected a man of his age and training to have learned to control. Even so, I could tell he regretted invoking the old argument.

That, obviously, did not absolve him for doing so. I sat up straight and answered coolly, "I was not the one who put her life in peril. Your love did more damage than mine could repair."

He stood, much too quickly for the feeble old fart he often pretended to be, and glowered down his beak at me. "Don't demeen my feelings by comparing them to yours!"

I set Katana on my bedroll and mirrored the motion. "You dare imply that I loved her any less for not bedding her? Which of you chuckle-fucks was there for her when she needed help most? You and Morzan were both off smacking sticks and measuring d—"

"You abandoned her to Morzan's treatment—"

"And you endangered her son!" After a second of consideration, I added, "Both of her sons!"

"I moved to Carvahall in the first place so I could watch over him—"

"Aye, and that's going so well? If you really wanted to keep him safe you would have ferried him out of the Empire— something neither Selena nor I could have done. At least then if he became a rider or rebel he'd be safe. But you're too much of a coward—"

"The Varden will take him apart as he is—!"

"Because his father has not prepared him!" I poked Brom in the chest, perhaps harder than was necessary. He stepped back, a foul expression in his shit-stain-brown eyes. "You are a more absentee guardian than Galba-fucking-torix. He may be a hellish amalgamation of traumas, but at least he had the guts to claim his bastard and train it to survive!"

Brom raised his hands to me as if I'd handed his point to him. "And, to the surprise of absolutely no one, here you are defending him!"

"If you don't realize that comparing the two of you is an insult to both, then you're beyond help!"

"Bold words for the rejected bastard of a leech—"

"Rich to be critiqued by a hypocritical waste of flesh—"

Brom licked his lips in preparation to unleash a blistering retort. In all likelihood, the verbal fighting would have exploded into a physical confrontation after a few more low blows. Instead, Katana cut both of us off before we could shove our feet farther in our mouths. Both of you; be quiet! The ward has been activated.

We both went totally silent. It was pointless of course— if the ward worked, we could not be heard; if it failed, we would easily be seen. But the instinct to freeze like a rabbit beneath a hawk's eye has protected humanity longer than logic. Quiet reigned as I monitored Katana's energy. The spell largely redirected any attempt to break through it rather than bear the force directly, but Torix had more than earned his reputation as a frightening mage. I'd never, in my entire life, tried to pit our power and skill head-to-head. For damn good reason! Now that it's happening, all I can do is hold my breath and hope.

Minutes flew by while the hour lingered. Time is unpredictable under that kind of stress. All I know for certain is that, eventually, it ended. I was free again to focus on the soft ambiance of the forest. This was interrupted only by a shaky exhale from my visitor. In a roundabout sort of way… my savior. I cleared my throat uncomfortably, all too aware that the timbre of our previous conversation reflected badly on both of us, especially in light of his life-saving assistance. "Look, Brom…"

"Don't bother apologizing; I know you meant every word."

I sighed and shrugged. "More in some places, less in others." My head lolled to the side to make the words more palatable. "About Selena…"

"I blame myself enough; I don't need your rebukes on top of my own."

"I wasn't going to talk more about her death; we'll never forgive each other or ourselves for that. I want to talk about her life. Meeting you restored a lot of her energy and joy for living. That was always one the best things about her. I never said it, but," I swallowed hard, ill-accustomed to the task at hand. "Thank you for reviving her."

"Gertrude and Marion," He began awkwardly, not acknowledging my concession, "spoke a little about how difficult Eragon's birth was. I know you did all you could to save them both. If she hadn't been so eager to return—"

"She had another son that needed her more. It would have taken more than an increased risk of illness to keep her from Murtagh— the rest was just bad luck."

"It was him she truly lived for; I just gave her a distraction when they were apart." He tapped the butt of his staff in the dirt. "How is he?"

"He's grown into a remarkable young man— very much like his mother."

"Stubborn and reckless?"

I laughed— not because I wanted to. "A kinder critic would say 'passionate' and 'brave,' but I think all four descriptors are warranted." Seeing in Brom's eyes that question which he was too tactful or nervous to ask, I continued, "If Morzan were a better man, he might have approved of him. But, as he ended up, he would have been thoroughly ashamed of Murtagh's kind heart and honorable soul."

"You two are close, then?"

I felt a little ill at the passing reference— every memory it conjured was now tainted with a confused fluttering. "As close as I thought safe for him. He fled Uru'baen a few weeks ago. If he's lucky, we'll not see each other again until Galbatorix is rotting in his grave."

Brom's lips twitched in an approximation of a smile. "Then he's already smarter and more courageous than his father."

"Tenfold."

"That in and of itself is no great achievement—"

"Come now! No one is calling Morzan a great wit, but he had nerve to rival a dragon! That's one of the only traits that he, Selena, and you all shared." I plopped to the ground again, exhausted from the emotional rollercoaster. "Since I'm no longer in immediate danger, I have no reason to hold you here. You should go before that snow rolls in."

"There won't be snow for at least another day." Brom lowered himself down across from me again. "I just wanted an excuse to keep you off balance."

"Tricksy old corpse, aren't you?" I tugged Katana back into my lap, stroking her surface like I would the fur of a pampered cat. "Do you enjoy riddle games?"

I was never going to "like" Brom in a friendly way— we'd been on opposite sides of a war too long and directly opposed on more personal matters after that. But I did learn to… appreciate him as he was. He was a wily old fart, an indecently cryptic wit, and a fully decent man. I didn't get the chance to meet many of those in my life. At one time I found myself considering that Tornac would have liked him. And, by extension, Murtagh would have too. (Not just because he killed Morzan, though that certainly would have helped Brom's case).

Now, the astute mage, (or a reader viewing this with the benefit of hindsight) will see a major problem with my safety measure. Aside from couriers or carrier birds (neither of which is feasible for a fugitive in the woods) scrying is the only method of long-range communication in Alagaesia. I told myself that I would be vigilant for any sign of trouble… but some signs creep up too quickly to prevent.

I didn't even know there was danger in the first place until I saw the pillar of smoke. It was visible clear across the valley; a black omen of tragedy. Not that I could have done much good even if I had been there— I could no more harm the Ra'zac than they could harm me. Still… Garrow might have been spared his grisly fate had there been a worthwhile distraction for the beaked bastards. While Eragon was unconscious, I met with Brom clandestinely to be debriefed on the situation and his schemes. Many computations of variables existed— too many to detail here— but they all ended with leaving Carvahall with Eragon in tow.

I committed myself to following their trail, wherever that would lead.

-:- -:- -:-

Their slow, awkward trek from the valley was painful to watch. It was a minor miracle that no one yet suspected their position or they would have been prime pickings for any of the lingering agents in the region. I spent an unreasonable amount of time spying on the duo; it was fascinating stuff to behold. Brom of course was unseeable— crafty old fox had taken some inspiration from our little experiment— but he obviously didn't think Eragon could be at risk for scrying yet. Either he forgot that I'd literally held the kid before his own mother had, or he didn't consider me a threat. In any case, I got to watch Eragon's first floundering steps into the world.

He was so different and yet so similar from his parents and brother. He had talent enough and the drive to turn it into real skill someday, but he was impressively naive about the most obvious things. At one point I caught him complaining aloud about how much his, "Back ached," after Brom "...pounded him." …. No one who'd been raised in joint by Morzan could have resisted a chuckle. I'll never know how the old man kept a straight face.

Considering the dangers abounding, their journey was relatively unexciting… until Yazuac.

I should have known better than to take my dinner in peace. That brief lapse in concentration was enough for all hell to break loose in the distant village. My nerves had been raw all day, though I couldn't put my finger on exactly why. Then, just as I swallowed my last bite of supper, a burst of blue light and smoke erupted overhead.

I dropped the bowl, snatched up my pack and bolted for the city. Three strides in and a shift in the wind revealed what I should have noticed sooner— the telltale sour twang of blood and rot. Gods, what happened here? It couldn't be another Varden attack, not this far north and so soon after the last! What could they possibly have wrought in a tiny hamlet like Ya'zauc— and why would they do it? A quick spell let me run up the side of the wall.

And then the truth was entirely too clear; a mountain of corpses topped with an unmistakably Urgal spear. I'd seen carnage like this exactly once, though on a smaller scale. I'd spent a night unconscious atop a much smaller pile of dead. It was like wading through the death of my own childhood; a haze of smoke and screams.

Repeated thums from above shook the whole world, though perhaps a softer than those that woke me from one nightmare into another all those years ago. I dropped to the ground within the city limits, pressing myself tight to the wall. The young dragonness Saphira shot through the sky directly over where I stood. I tripled my mental barrier and poked my head out of an alley to peer down the main avenue.

Amid the frenzied footprints of the slain and slayers, I found the fresher imprint of horse tracks. These led to the base of the defiled victims of the massacre where two horses, two men, and a dragon were gathered. They were too far away to make out every word, but I ascertained that Brom was the only one badly hurt. I did a quick cursory scan of the city to see if any other hostiles were lingering about.

My consciousness accidentally bumped Brom's in the middle of the exact same task and, rather than recoil at once, he offered his intelligence. All safe. Urgal attack. More later. The clipped assessment was notably lacking in the information I really wanted to know— the source of the light.

It couldn't have been Eragon; he doesn't even know that he has access to magic yet! One of my lessons from long ago re-emerged; one that hinged on the same trauma that my present view invoked. A lonely evening tied to a log, and then an act of defiance against imagined death. He is Selena's son; I wouldn't be surprised at all if a life-and-death scenario led him to find magic on his own. I was able to do it with just an insinuation! Faced with the real thing, it's a miracle he didn't level the whole town or perish from exhaustion.

He has fallen from his shell and gone directly on the hunt— he has to learn fast if he's going to survive. Katana understood my trepidation, but she also held a certain admiration for the youngling's tenacity.

I just shook my head in disbelief. I know… but, at this pace, he's liable to burn too bright and burn out. I crouched down as Saphira launched to the sky. To my surprise, it was Brom's consciousness that receded with her departure. The boy followed her path, escorting the horses as best as he could on his shaky legs. What an honor for Brom! Even when dragons were relatively common sights, they almost never allowed any but their chosen rider to sit astride them. When do you think he was last in the sky?

It's been twice as long for him as it has for you, and it already feels like an eternity since I had the wind beneath my wings. Katana's longing redoubled my own. She had largely embraced a noncorporeal existence these past decades… but no dragon could escape the instinct to take wing.

Someday, I will master Siyamak-ebrithil's old techniques, and then I can be your wings. I certainly had the best shot of achieving that goal out of everyone who'd ever lived; many of the man's notes and journals had been saved from incineration by pure chance, all safely stored in Uru'baen…

A place that I currently hoped to never see again.

Katana showed no emotion (positive or negative) for that consideration. There will be time to think on that after we've made camp. We'd better get to trailing Eragon if we don't want to be blundering around in the dark.

I will… after I do two more things. I stepped out into the road and dusted off my knees. I want to look for survivors and put these people to rest in some fashion.

We don't have time to dig a few hundred graves.

No, but we don't need to leave them to be vermin-fare either. It was scarcely the work of a half hour to be certain no living beings remained in the city, save the circling crows and rejoicing rodents. I also took the chance to examine an alley containing two blackened blasted corpses and a dusting of fresh soot. That little virtuoso. This is damn good work, for a panicked child. Hell, it's decent work for a proffessional!

The longer I walked, the more irregularities I noticed. Nearly every sign pointed to an Urgal assault: boot prints, weaponry, and sheer brutality. But there were just as many anomolies too. For one thing, it was historically signifigant for Urgals to be moving in numbers large enough to wipe out a city with ease. For another, there were other townsteads between Yazuac and their nesting grounds; why had none of them been similarly targeted? And though the violence and combat prowess matched their reputation well enough, there was something methodical in this slaughter; almost clinical. If they'd been this detailed in the attack on my home village, I would not be alive today. And why take the time to pile murdered civilians in the town's center? Urgals are a dangerous and war-like culture to be sure, but this is… excessive.

Could it be in retalliation to some attack from the Empire? Katana's point carried considerable merit. Urgals rarely attacked whole cities unprovoked; or, if they did, it was only to avenge some mass-hunting of their kin (an unfortunately common practice in far-gone times).

I considered that angle most carefully. I doubt it; Galbatorix's last attempt to invade their lands cost him dearly, and it was such a legendary victory for them that I doubt they are yet ravenous for more bloodshed. Ya'zauc is too far out in the plains to seek trouble from the mountains. As we tossed the matter around, I set to the grim task of examing the victims of the tragedy. Two details stuck out, though one was more obvious than the other. The first was the nightmarish faces on many of the corpses— fixed and twisted in gruesome expressions. This too was unusual of the Ugralgra; only a lucky few of these people had died quickly.

I leaned against a house, breathing heavily through my mouth to escape the pervasive stench. If it's a statement of intent, I would call it no less than a declaration of war. But if we've been invaded, why is one lonely, strategically worthless city the only victim? Where are the soldiers, where are the couriers and spies—

Scouring Alagaesia for the new rider.

I swore. Of course Galbatorix would prioritize hunting a teenager over protecting his people. Still, that alone wouldn't explain a total lack of response. Someone would have noticed something! The traders had talked of an, "increase in Urgal sightings," but that in no way justified the numbers measured here. Waking from my daze, I refocused on the garish mound before me. There, poking between the bodies of a young woman and an elderly man, was the unmistakable tip of a horn. I scanned the corpses again, and sure enough there were at least a dozen similar signs— here a grey-tinged hand, there a yellowed nail, and pairs of horns dotted among the other skulls. This is much worse than we feared.

How so?

We theorized the corpses were left to send a message— of rage or dominance, it's hard to say. But both of these theories fall apart if they've piled their own dead here as well. Their funeral rights might be different from ours, but there is no glory in defiling your fallen comrades.

Where does that leave us?

We must conclude that whoever—or whatever— is behind this attack sees humans and Urgals as equal; equally worthless. Katana and I both knew how short that list truly was. Elves, ostensibly, cherished all life and had no quarrel with mankind (Galbatorix notwithstanding, of course). The dwarves had no particular love for humans, but they certainly took a narrower view of Urgals than the elves. The entities or creatures I knew of who were capable of this atrocity were also… bound in service to the king.

Katana and I reached this conclusion in near-perfect synchronization. As much as I wanted to disprove it, no obvious contradiction offered itself. It even explains how no border guards or patrols noticed them— their orders kept them clear of the marching path.

Surely, it can't be that simple! why would he order his own cities razed? Katana trailed off as I proffered the memory of his childish tantrum only a few months earlier:

"Burn them at the stake and bury their ashes with dung!" Compared to that, a pile of corpses was quite plausible indeed. If we're right, this is only going to get worse. I don't know exactly how he could have enthralled the Urgal tribes, but this will not be the last bloodshed to come of it. I adjusted the straps of my pack and started at a brisk pace down the main road. I'll have a hell of a time conveying any of this to Brom without "discussing the king's business."

Katana commiserated with me on the irritating gambit of charades that most certainly awaited me in the near future. Aren't you forgetting something?

I slowed to a stop and turned. I'd been in more of a hurry than even I'd realized; the mass grave had blurred in the darkness to one ill-formed mass. A pity we can't do better for them.

We can make sure the one responsible sees justice. Hoardes more of the innocent dead paraded through our mental link. By our very own claws, if no one else is equal to the task.

I savored a mental image of ripping Torix's throat out with my bare hands. Until then… "Stydja unin mor'ranr; may your souls float peacefully to the lands of your ancestors. And forgive me this final injustice," I breathed deeply of the crisp night air. "Brisingr." Katana loaned her strength to the casting to make sure the heat source would be as even and intense as possible. The ground around the pile glowed with light, though the actual flames were indigo, midnight, and navy. They ran through the available fuel like the spring melts raced into dry creek beds; like tragedy churned into innocent lives.

I turned my back on the grisly pyre.

By daybreak, only ashes would remain of that cursed place and the horrors within. I waited up until the freshly minted mage gave in to his exhaustion then got a more thorough explanation from Brom. Thank every guiding spirit that this kid knew one single word of the ancient language. If he'd gone in to the endeavor totally blind, he would have jumped from "stick-fighting is to hard!" to the single most dangerous kind of spellcraft. Still, it was slim comfort to his panicked father. Most guardians worry about discussing bodily changes or complex emotions with their teens— Brom had to teach his how to wield the fabric of reality.

I find it a little funny that Eragon accidentally chose one of the more dangerous… for lack of a better word, "sub-genres" of simple magic. Fire has a high energy cost-to-effectiveness ratio and is notoriously difficult to control. So, for a total amateur to not only cast a one-word spell and survive the ordeal, but to actually kill two Urgals in the process? I admit that any doubt I had about his future was wiped clean that very evening: this kid was going to grow into a force of nature someday.

But powerful storms take time to build. And, as Yazuac showed us too clearly, time was the one ingredient we least had at our disposal. He didn't have the luxury of growing into his potential: he'd need to have it forced on him as fast as he could stomach it.

AN: Hi again ^^;;

No excuses this time guys... I just ran face-first into a concrete wall of writer's block. I started and scrapped this one a bajillion times, which is triply ironic since it's the first chapter that has the plot laid out for me! I'd love to hear what folks think might be missing (It all still feels a bit... toothless?)

The next chapter will be centered on... a very special place for this particular narrator.

Thank you all for the love this story has been shown even in my negligence. I promise that I * will * complete this story, if it's the last thing I do!