Once his head cleared, he slowly got back to his feet, using Brisingr for support. He leaned on the sword, standing hunched like an old man while he waited for the ache in his stomach to subside.
“You cheated,” he said between gritted teeth.
“No, I exploited a weakness in my opponent. There is a difference.”
“You think … that is a weakness?”
“When we fight, yes. Do you wish to continue?”
He answered by yanking Brisingr out of the sod, marching back to where he had started, and raising his sword.
“Good,” said Arya. She mirrored his pose.
This time Eragon was much more wary as he closed with her, and Arya did not stay in the same place. With careful steps, she advanced, her clear green eyes never leaving him.
She twitched, and Eragon flinched.
He realized he was holding his breath and forced himself to relax.
Another step forward, then he swung with all his speed and might.
She blocked his cut to her ribs and replied with a jab toward his exposed armpit. The blunted edge of her sword slid across the back of his free hand, scraping against the mail sewn onto his gauntlet as he slapped the blade away. At that moment, Arya’s torso was exposed, but they were too close for Eragon to effectively slash or stab.
Instead, he lunged forward and struck at her breastbone with the pommel of his sword, thinking to knock her to the ground, as she had done to him.
She twisted out of the way, and the pommel went through the space where she had been as Eragon stumbled forward.
Without knowing quite how it had happened, he found himself standing motionless with one of Arya’s arms wrapped around his neck and the cool, slippery surface of her spell-bound blade pressed against the side of his jaw.
From behind him, Arya whispered into his right ear, “I could have removed your head as easily as plucking an apple from a tree.”
Then she released her hold and shoved him away. Angry, he whirled around and saw that she was already waiting for him, her sword at the ready and her expression determined.
Giving in to his anger, Eragon sprang after her.
Four blows they exchanged, each more terrible than the last. Arya struck first, chopping at his legs. He parried and slashed crosswise at her waist, but she skipped out of reach of Brisingr’s glittering, sunlit edge. Without giving her an opportunity to retaliate, he followed up with a looping underhand cut, which she blocked with deceptive ease. Then she stepped forward and, with a touch as light as a hummingbird’s wing, drew her sword across his belly.
Arya held her position at the conclusion of the stroke, her face mere inches from his. Her forehead glistened and her cheeks were flushed.
With exaggerated care, they disengaged.
Eragon straightened his tunic, then squatted next to Arya. His battle rage had burned itself out and left him focused, if not entirely at ease.
“I don’t understand,” he said quietly.
“You have become too accustomed to fighting Galbatorix’s soldiers. They cannot hope to match you, so you take chances that would otherwise prove your undoing. Your attacks are too obvious—you should not rely on brute strength—and you have grown lax in your defense.”
“Will you help me?” he asked. “Will you spar with me when you can?”
She nodded. “Of course. But if I cannot, then go to Blödhgarm for instruction; he is as skilled with a blade as I am. Practice is the only remedy you need, practice with the proper partners.”
Eragon had just opened his mouth to thank her when he felt the presence of a consciousness other than Saphira’s pressing against his mind, vast and frightening and filled with the most profound melancholy: a sadness so great, Eragon’s throat tightened and the colors of the world seemed to lose their luster. And, in a slow, deep voice, as if speaking was a struggle of almost unbearable proportions, the golden dragon Glaedr said:
You must learn … to see what you are looking at.
Then the presence vanished, leaving behind a black void.
Eragon looked at Arya. She appeared as stricken as he was; she had heard Glaedr’s words as well. Beyond her, Blödhgarm and the other elves stirred and murmured, while by the edge of the road, Saphira craned her neck as she tried to look at the saddlebags tied to her back.