Murtagh

Thorn snorted. A dangerous word, that.

“Indeed,” said Murtagh softly. He felt rather awed by the word. Such a simple one, and yet so profound. Galbatorix would never have dared teach it to him. In truth, deyja likely wasn’t that useful. Murtagh guessed that most magicians would have a ward that would block its effects. And yet to see it, to know it, felt significant, as if he had surmounted a spire built over a measureless void.

He wondered what the word for life was.

He kept reading, hoping to find it. Instead, he chanced upon the word naina. “To make bright. Light without fire. See also líjothsa.” He turned to the entry for líjothsa and read: “Light as the thing itself. See also naina.”

His brow furrowed as he parsed the difference. Then his thoughts shifted to the light-emitting quartz he’d encountered within the catacombs and also the difficulty he’d had illuminating Isenstar Lake while in the water. Fire was a poor choice for underwater light; it created too many bubbles and too much steam.

Murtagh glanced up. The morning sky was clear and bright, filled with a seemingly endless pool of sunlit radiance. What if…The spell that he used to hide Thorn from observers worked—as best he could tell—by thickening the air underneath the dragon’s body so that it bent the light around him, similar to how a lens of polished glass might.

Perhaps he could modify the spell to gather light from a large area around them and concentrate it on a single spot, to use in place of a lantern or to store for later need.

On a whim, he poured some water into his battered tin plate and then cleared his mind, chose the needed words from the ancient language—the spell was awkward, but he thought it would do what he wanted—and said, “Vindr thrysta un líjothsa athaerum,” with the intent of focusing the light onto the plate.

BAM!

A flash as bright as the sun exploded in front of him, a crack of thunder echoed across the plain, and a cloud of cinders and superheated steam blasted outward. Murtagh felt the heat against his face as he fell backward, his wards activating.

Thorn let out a startled roar and reared up, spreading his wings. A tongue of red flame flickered in his mouth.

With some dismay, Murtagh saw their campfire blasted to bits: pieces of smoldering embers lay scattered in every direction, and the ground was blackened. Wisps of smoke curled up from patches of dry grass. The pan with his bacon was folded in half, the bacon itself lost somewhere in the dirt.

Cursing, Murtagh ran about and stomped out the cinders before they could start a wildfire.

What did you do? Thorn asked, his wings still slightly raised.

“I’m not sure. It was just light!” Then Murtagh explained what he had been trying to accomplish. He shook his head. “I definitely won’t use that spell again unless it’s at a distance.”

A long distance.

“Agreed.”

***

They continued to follow the Ninor River until it began to bend more to the west and south than to the north, at which point they broke from the river and struck out across the trackless plains.

Not for the first time, it occurred to Murtagh how empty Alagaësia was. For all the efforts of humans, dwarves, and elves, vast swaths of the land remained unsettled, undeveloped, and uncivilized. Part of him preferred it that way. If all the world were as cramped as Ilirea or Dras-Leona, there would be no place for those who didn’t belong.

In early afternoon, Murtagh composed a stanza that he particularly liked:

Atop the tower a hollow man,

Shell of shadow, void within,

Bound by words, a villain’s blade.

A name of shame, a fear of fate.

Break the bond, change the path,

The shell remains, a haunting shade.

By evening, the Spine had faded into sight far ahead of them as a line of purple jags propped against the reddened sky.

Their camp that night felt terribly alone. The land was flat, with few ridges or washes and thus nowhere to hide. Despite the lack of cover, they shared a sense of relief at the absence of copses, caves, or other enclosures. Thorn more so than Murtagh, but they were both glad to have a break, if only for a day, from Thorn’s fear of narrow spaces.

They made their own shelter beneath Thorn’s wing, and Murtagh amused the dragon by singing songs from court, and he even danced a step or two for Thorn’s benefit.

And that was the second day.

***

On the third day, the eerie howls of a wolf pack woke them before sunrise. The wolves were loping across the grasslands some miles to the south, and their baying carried with surprising volume and clarity through the still morning air. Even at that distance, Murtagh could see how large the animals were; they must have been twice the size of a mastiff, with tawny coats and long, thick tails.