“We have so many prisoners already. And once we take Dras-Leona …” She shook her head.

Appearing suddenly animated, Orrin said, “What if we bypass Dras-Leona entirely?” He shuffled through the slew of papers on the desk until he located a large, dwarf-drawn map of Alagaësia, which he draped over the scarps of administerial records. The tottering mounds underneath gave the land an unusual topography: peaks in the west of Du Weldenvarden; a bowl-like depression where the Beor Mountains lay; canyons and ravines throughout the Hadarac Desert; and rolling waves along the northernmost part of the Spine, born of the rows of scrolls below. “Look.” With his middle finger, he traced a line from Belatona to the capital of the Empire, Urû’baen. “If we march straight there, we won’t come anywhere near Dras-Leona. It would be difficult to traverse the whole stretch all at once, but we could do it.”

Nasuada did not need to ponder his suggestion; she had already considered the possibility. “The risk would be too great. Galbatorix could still attack us with the soldiers he has stationed in Dras-Leona—which is no small number, if our spies are to be trusted—and then we’d end up fending off attacks from two directions at once. I know of no quicker way to lose a battle, or a war. No, we must capture Dras-Leona.”

Orrin conceded the point with a slight dip of his head. “We need our men back from Aroughs, then. We need every warrior if we are to continue.”

“I know. I intend to make sure that the siege is brought to an end before the week is out.”

“Not by sending Eragon there, I hope.”

“No, I have a different plan.”

“Good. And in the meantime? What shall we do with these prisoners?”

“What we have done before: guards, fences, and padlocks. Maybe we can also bind the prisoners with spells to restrict their movement, so that we don’t have to keep watch over them so closely. Other than that, I see no solution, except to slaughter the whole lot of them, and I would rather—” She tried to imagine what she would not do in order to defeat Galbatorix. “I would rather not resort to such … drastic measures.”

“Aye.” Orrin stooped over the map, hunching his shoulders like a vulture as he glared at the squiggles of faded ink that marked the triangle of Belatona, Dras-Leona, and Urû’baen.

And so he remained until Nasuada said, “Is there anything else we must attend to? Jörmundur is waiting for his orders, and the Council of Elders has requested an audience with me.”

“I worry.”

“What about?”

Orrin swept a hand over the map. “That this venture was ill conceived from the start.… That our forces, and those of our allies, are dangerously scattered, and that if Galbatorix should take it in his head to join in the fight himself, he could destroy us as easily as Saphira could a herd of goats. Our entire strategy depends upon contriving a meeting between Galbatorix, Eragon, Saphira, and as many spellcasters as we can muster. Only a small portion of those spellcasters are currently among our ranks, and we won’t be able to gather the rest into a single place until we arrive at Urû’baen and meet with Queen Islanzadí and her army. Until that happens, we remain woefully vulnerable to attack. We are risking much on the assumption that Galbatorix’s arrogance will hold him in check until our trap has sprung shut around him.”

Nasuada shared his concerns. However, it was more important to shore up Orrin’s confidence than to commiserate with him, for if his resolve weakened, it would interfere with his duties and undermine the morale of his men. “We are not entirely defenseless,” she said. “Not anymore. We have the Dauthdaert now, and with it, I think we might actually be able to kill Galbatorix and Shruikan, should they emerge from within the confines of Urû’baen.”

“Perhaps.”

“Besides, it does no good to worry. We cannot hasten the dwarves here, nor speed our own progress toward Urû’baen, nor turn tail and flee. So I would not let our situation trouble you excessively. All we can do is strive to accept our fate with grace, whatever it might be. The alternative is to allow the thought of Galbatorix’s possible actions to unsettle our minds, and that I won’t do. I refuse to give him such power over me.”

RUDELY INTO THE LIGHT …

scream rang out: high, jagged, and piercing, almost inhuman in pitch and volume.

Eragon tensed as if someone had stabbed him with a needle. He had spent the better part of the day watching men fight and die—killing scores himself—yet he could not help but feel concern as he heard Elain’s cries of anguish. The sounds she made were so terrible, he had begun to wonder if she would survive the birth.

Next to him, beside the barrel that served as his seat, Albriech and Baldor squatted on their hams, picking at the tattered blades of grass between their shoes. Their thick fingers shredded each scrap of leaf and stalk with methodical thoroughness before groping for the next. Sweat glistened on their foreheads, and their eyes were hard with anger and despair. Occasionally, they exchanged glances or looked across the lane at the tent where their mother was, but otherwise they stared at the ground and ignored their surroundings.

A few feet away, Roran sat on his own barrel, which lay on its side and wobbled whenever he moved. Clustered along the edge of the muddy lane were several dozen people from Carvahall, mostly men who were friends of Horst and his sons or whose wives were helping the healer Gertrude attend to Elain. And towering behind them was Saphira. Her neck was arched like a drawn bow, the tip of her tail twitched as if she were hunting, and she kept flicking her ruby-red tongue in and out of her mouth, tasting the air for any scents that might provide information about Elain or her unborn child.