Look into your heart, Eragon, said Glaedr. You already know who he is, and you have known for a long time.

Eragon shook his head. “I don’t know! I don’t know! Please . . .”

A gout of smoke and flame jetted from Glaedr’s nostrils as he snorted. Is it not obvious? Your father is Brom.

TWO LOVERS DOOMED

Eragon gaped at the gold dragon.

“But how?” he exclaimed. Before either Glaedr or Oromis could respond, Eragon whirled toward Saphira and, with both his mind and his voice, he said, “You knew? You knew, and yet you let me believe Morzan was my father this whole time, even though it . . . even though I—I . . .” His chest heaving, Eragon stuttered and trailed off, unable to speak coherently. Unbidden, memories of Brom flooded through him, washing away his other thoughts. He reconsidered the meaning of Brom’s every word and expression, and in that instant, a sense of rightness settled over Eragon. He still wanted explanations, but he did not need them in order to determine the veracity of Glaedr’s claim, for in his bones, Eragon felt the truth of what Glaedr had said.

Eragon started as Oromis touched him on the shoulder. “Eragon, you need to calm yourself,” said the elf in a soothing tone. “Remember the techniques I taught you for meditating. Control your breathing, and concentrate upon letting the tension drain out of your limbs into the ground beneath you. . . . Yes, like that. Now again, and breathe deeply.”

Eragon’s hands grew still and his heartbeat slowed as he followed Oromis’s instructions. Once his thoughts had cleared, he looked at Saphira again and in a soft voice said, “You knew?”

Saphira lifted her head from the ground. Oh, Eragon, I wanted to tell you. It pained me to see how Murtagh’s words tormented you and yet to be unable to help you. I tried to help—I tried so many times—but like Oromis and Glaedr, I too swore in the ancient language to keep Brom’s identity a secret from you, and I could not break my oath.

“Wh-when did he tell you?” Eragon asked, so agitated that he continued speaking out loud.

The day after the Urgals attacked us outside of Teirm, while you were still unconscious.

“Was that also when he told you how to contact the Varden in Gil’ead?”

Yes. Before I knew what Brom wished to say, he had me swear to never speak of this with you unless you found out on your own. To my regret, I agreed.

“Is there anything else he told you?” demanded Eragon, his anger rising again. “Any other secrets I ought to know, like that Murtagh isn’t my only sibling, or perhaps how to defeat Galbatorix?”

During the two days Brom and I spent hunting the Urgals, Brom recounted the details of his life to me so that if he died, and if ever you learned of your relation to him, his son could know what kind of a man he was and why he had acted as he did. Also, Brom gave me a gift for you.

A gift?

A memory of him speaking to you as your father and not as Brom the storyteller.

“Before Saphira shares this memory with you, however,” said Oromis, and Eragon realized she had allowed the elf to hear her words, “it would be best, I think, if you knew how this came to pass. Will you listen to me for a while, Eragon?”

Eragon hesitated, unsure of what he wanted, then nodded.

Lifting his crystal goblet, Oromis drank of his wine, then returned the goblet to the table and said: “As you know, both Brom and Morzan were my apprentices. Brom, who was the younger by three years, held Morzan in such high esteem, he allowed Morzan to belittle him, order him about, and otherwise treat him most shamefully.”

In a raspy voice, Eragon said, “It’s hard to imagine Brom letting anyone order him about.”

Oromis inclined his head in a quick, birdlike dip. “And yet, so it was. Brom loved Morzan as a brother, despite his behavior. It was only once Morzan betrayed the Riders to Galbatorix and the Forsworn killed Saphira, Brom’s dragon, that Brom realized the true nature of Morzan’s character. As strong as Brom’s affection for Morzan had been, it was like a candle before an inferno compared with the hatred that replaced it. Brom swore to thwart Morzan however and wherever he could, to undo his accomplishments and reduce his ambitions to bitter regrets. I cautioned Brom against a path so full of hate and violence, but he was mad with grief from the death of Saphira, and he would not listen to me.

“In the decades that followed, Brom’s hatred never weakened, nor did he falter in his efforts to depose Galbatorix, kill the Forsworn, and, above all else, to repay Morzan the hurts he had suffered. Brom was persistence embodied, his name a nightmare for the Forsworn and a beacon of hope for those who still had the spirit to resist the Empire.” Oromis looked toward the white line of the horizon and took another draught of his wine. “I am rather proud of what he achieved on his own and without the aid of his dragon. It is always heartening for a teacher to see one of his students excel, however it might be. . . . But I digress. It so happened, then, that some twenty years ago, the Varden began to receive reports from their spies within the Empire about the activities of a mysterious woman known only as the Black Hand.”

“My mother,” said Eragon.

“Your mother and Murtagh’s,” said Oromis. “At first the Varden knew nothing about her, save that she was extremely dangerous and that she was loyal to the Empire. In time, and after a great deal of bloodshed, it became apparent that she served Morzan, and Morzan alone, and that he had come to depend upon her to carry out his will throughout the Empire. Upon learning of this, Brom set out to kill the Black Hand and so to strike at Morzan. Since the Varden could not predict where your mother might appear next, Brom traveled to Morzan’s castle and spied upon it until he was able to devise a means of infiltrating the hold.”