The last thing he heard was Saphira shouting,Eragon!

Despite the intensity of the fit, Eragon remained conscious throughout his ordeal. Not that he was aware of his surroundings, only the fire that burned in his flesh and prolonged each second into an eternity. The worst part was that he could do nothing to end his suffering but wait . . .

. . . and wait . . .

Eragon lay panting in the cold mud. He blinked as his vision came into focus and he saw Oromis sitting on a stool next to him. Pushing himself onto his knees, Eragon surveyed his new tunic with a mixture of regret and disgust. The fine russet cloth was caked with dirt from his convulsions on the ground. Muck filled his hair as well.

He could sense Saphira in his mind, radiating concern as she waited for him to notice her.How can you continue like this? she fretted.It’ll destroy you.

Her misgivings undermined Eragon’s remaining fortitude. Saphira had never before expressed doubt that he would prevail, not at Dras-Leona, Gil’ead, or Farthen Dûr, nor with any of the dangers they had encountered. Her confidence had given him courage. Without it he was truly afraid.

You should concentrate on your lesson,he said.

I should concentrate on you.

Leave me alone!He snapped at her like a wounded animal that wants to nurse its injuries in silence and in dark. She fell silent, leaving just enough of their connection intact so that he was vaguely aware of Glaedr teaching her about fireweed, which she could chew to help her digestion.

Eragon combed the mud from his hair with his fingers, then spat out a globule of blood. “Bit my tongue.”

Oromis nodded as if it were to be expected. “Do you require healing?”

“No.”

“Very well. Tend to your sword, then bathe and go to the stump in the glade and listen to the thoughts of the forest. Listen, and when you hear no more, come tell me what you have learned.”

“Yes, Master.”

As he sat on the stump, Eragon found that his turbulent thoughts and emotions prevented him from mustering the concentration to open his mind and sense the creatures in the hollow. Nor was he interested in doing so.

Still, the peaceful quality of his surroundings gradually ameliorated his resentment, confusion, and stubborn anger. It did not make him happy, but it did bring him a certain fatalistic acceptance.This is my lot in life, and I’d better get used to it because it’s not about to improve in the foreseeable future.

After a quarter of an hour, his faculties had regained their usual acuity, so he resumed studying the colony of red ants that he had discovered the day before. He also tried to be aware of everything else that was happening in the glade, as Oromis had instructed.

Eragon met with limited success. If he relaxed and allowed himself to absorb input from all the consciousnesses nearby, thousands of images and feelings rushed into his head, piling on top of one another in quick flashes of sound and color, touch and smell, pain and pleasure. The amount of information was overwhelming. Out of pure habit, his mind would snatch one subject or another from the torrent, excluding all the rest before he noticed his lapse and wrenched himself back into a state of passive receptivity. The cycle repeated itself every few seconds.

Despite that, he was able to improve his understanding of the ants’ world. He got his first clue as to their genders when he deduced that the huge ant in the heart of their underground lair was laying eggs, one every minute or so, which made it—her—a female. And when he accompanied a group of the red ants up the stem of their rosebush, he got a vivid demonstration of the kind of enemies they faced: something darted out from underneath a leaf and killed one of the ants he was bound to. It was hard for him to guess exactly what the creature was, since the ants only saw fragments of it and, in any case, they placed more emphasis on smell than vision. If they had been people, he would have said that they were attacked by a terrifying monster the size of a dragon, which had jaws as powerful as the spiked portcullis at Teirm and could move with whiplash speed.

The ants ringed in the monster like grooms working to capture a runaway horse. They darted at it with a total lack of fear, nipping at its knobbed legs and withdrawing an instant before they were caught in the monster’s iron pincers. More and more ants joined the throng. They worked together to overpower the intruder, never faltering, even when two were caught and killed and when several of their brethren fell off the stem to the ground below.

It was a desperate battle, with neither side willing to give quarter. Only escape or victory would save the combatants from a horrible death. Eragon followed the fray with breathless anticipation, awed by the ants’ bravery and how they continued to fight in spite of injuries that would incapacitate a human. Their feats were heroic enough to be sung about by bards throughout the land.

Eragon was so engrossed by the contest that when the ants finally prevailed, he loosed an elated cry so loud, it roused the birds from their roosts among the trees.

Out of curiosity, he returned his attention to his own body, then walked to the rosebush to view the dead monster for himself. What he saw was an ordinary brown spider with its legs curled into a fist being transported by the ants down to their nest for food.

Amazing.

He started to leave, but then realized that once again he had neglected to keep watch over the myriad other insects and animals in the glade. He closed his eyes and whirled through the minds of several dozen beings, doing his best to memorize as many interesting details as he could. It was a poor substitute for prolonged observation, but he was hungry and he had already exhausted his assigned hour.