“Yes, but we can reason with him and try to help him see that life is still worth living.”

She was still for a while, her face solemn; then she said, “I do not want him to die. No elf does. However, if every waking moment is a torment to him, then won’t it be better for him to seek release?”

Neither Eragon nor Saphira had an answer for her.

The three of them continued to discuss the day’s events for a short while longer; then Saphira pulled her head out of the tent and went to sit on the neighboring patch of grass. I feel like a fox with her head stuck down a rabbit hole, she complained. It makes my scales itch, not being able to see if someone is creeping up on me.

Eragon expected Arya to leave as well, but to his surprise, she stayed, seemingly content to sit and talk with him about this and that. He was only too eager to comply. His earlier hunger had vanished during his bouts of mental combat with her, Saphira, and Glaedr, and in any case, he was more than willing to forgo a hot meal in exchange for the pleasure of her company.

Night closed in around them, and the camp grew ever quieter as their conversation meandered from one topic to another. Eragon felt giddy from exhaustion and excitement—almost as if he had drunk too much mead—and he noticed that Arya also seemed more at ease than normal. They talked of many things: of Glaedr and of their sparring; of the siege of Dras-Leona and what might be done about it; and of other, less important matters, such as the crane Arya had seen hunting among the rushes by the edge of the lake, and the scale Saphira had lost from her nose, and how the season was turning and the days were again growing colder. But always they returned to the one topic that was ever present in their thoughts, and that was Galbatorix and what awaited them in Urû’baen.

While they speculated, as they had so many times before, about the types of magical traps Galbatorix might have set for them and how best to avoid them, Eragon thought of Saphira’s question about Glaedr, and he said, “Arya?”

“Yes?” She drew the word out, her voice rising and falling with a faint lilt.

“What do you want to do once this is all over?” If we’re still alive, that is.

“What do you want to do?”

He fingered Brisingr’s pommel as he considered the question. “I don’t know. I haven’t let myself think much past Urû’baen.… It would depend on what she wants, but I suppose Saphira and I might return to Palancar Valley. I could build a hall on one of the foothills of the mountains. We might not spend much time there, but at least we would have a home to return to when we weren’t flying from one part of Alagaësia to another.” He half smiled. “I’m sure there will be plenty to keep us busy, even if Galbatorix is dead.… But you still haven’t answered my question: what will you do if we win? You must have some idea. You’ve had longer to think about it than I have.”

Arya drew one leg up onto the stool, wrapped her arms around it, and rested her chin on her knee. In the dim half-light of the tent, her face appeared to float against a featureless black background, like an apparition conjured out of the night.

“I have spent more time among humans and dwarves than I have among the älfakyn,” she said, using the elves’ name in the ancient language. “I have grown used to it, and I would not want to return to live in Ellesméra. Too little happens there; centuries can slip by without notice while you sit and stare at the stars. No, I think I will continue to serve my mother as her ambassador. The reason I first left Du Weldenvarden was because I wanted to help right the balance of the world. As you said, there will still be much that needs doing if we manage to topple Galbatorix, much that needs putting right, and I would be a part of it.”

“Ah.” It was not exactly what he had hoped she might say, but at least it presented the possibility that they would not entirely lose contact after Urû’baen, and that he would still be able to see her now and then.

If Arya noticed his discontent, she gave no sign of it.

They talked for another few minutes, then Arya made her excuses and rose to leave.

As she stepped past him, Eragon reached toward her, as if to stop her, then quickly drew back his hand. “Wait,” he said softly, unsure of what he hoped for, but hoping nevertheless. The beat of his heart increased, pounding in his ears, and his cheeks grew warm.

Arya paused with her back to him by the entrance of the tent. “Good night, Eragon,” she said. Then she slipped out between the entrance flaps and vanished into the night, leaving him to sit alone in the dark.

DISCOVERY

he next three days passed quickly for Eragon, if not for the rest of the Varden, who remained mired in lethargy. The standoff with Dras-Leona continued unabated, although there was some excitement when Thorn altered his customary location from above the front gates to a section of the rampart several hundred feet to the right. After much discussion—and after consulting extensively with Saphira—Nasuada and her advisers concluded that Thorn had relocated for no other reason than comfort; the other section of rampart was somewhat flatter and longer. Aside from that, the siege lumbered on without change.

Meanwhile, Eragon spent the mornings and evenings studying with Glaedr and the afternoons sparring with Arya and several other elves. His matches with the elves were not as long or strenuous as his previous one with Arya—for it would have been foolish to push himself that hard every day—but his sessions with Glaedr were as intense as ever. The ancient dragon never flagged in his efforts to improve Eragon’s skills and knowledge, and he made no allowances for mistakes or exhaustion.