I knew Eragon was going to be a pain in the ass the second Roran and his fiance were teleported away.

He wasn’t exactly a master of subterfuge and I had months of practice dealing with a bored Yoruichi. I knew the signs of someone gearing up to do something incredibly frustrating to me and running off before anyone could retaliate.

So before I did anything else I tossed a handful of the gems I used to make the illusionary bounded field for our camp the other night to hide the entrances back into the mountain. It wouldn’t actually stop him – the fields were only strong enough to show an image and put up some very slight resistance to anything moving through them – but it stopped him from rabbiting long enough for Saphira to realize something was wrong and pin her Rider underfoot.

“So Eragon,” I said calmly to the trapped teenager. “Any particular reason you looked like you were about to run off when we are leaving?”

“L-look, I can’t leave yet.” Eragon stuttered as he tried and failed to push the very unimpressed dragon off his chest. “Think about what the Ra’zac had here in Helgrind! Potions, scrolls, information about the Empire’s activities – things that could help us!” He tried to dislodge Saphira again. “We can’t let Galbatorix recover those and you and Saphira can’t stay here, so I’ll stay behind and–”

“Figure out what to do with Katrina’s father?” I interrupted.

Honestly, I had completely forgotten about the man. He wasn’t exactly important outside of his relationships to Roran and the others from Carvahall. I likely never would have remembered he existed if Katrina hadn’t asked about him.

I’m not exactly sure how either one accepted Eragon’s word he was dead because the Rider was a terrible liar.

My guess Katrina was too distraught by her own captivity and Roran just didn’t give a damn if he was dead or not.

It was only thanks to Eragon that I remembered the man was the reason the Rider stayed behind in the Empire out of some sense of responsibility and his desire to not execute a man when he was helpless or something like that. A little weird considering Sloan was condemned to death thanks to his betrayal that led to him being held captive in the first place but for once I wasn’t going to judge too harshly.

While he had killed dozens of normal soldiers in the last battle, if he didn’t want to kill a man off the battlefield then that was his line and I’d do my best to accept it.

I wasn’t about to support his nonexistent plan to not kill Sloan, but I could respect his choice.

“How–?”

“You aren’t that good a liar.” I replied. “But that doesn’t matter right now. All you need to worry about is getting you and Saphira onto the teleportation circle and getting back to the Varden.”

“Alexandra…I can’t let Katrina or Roran see him, and I can’t just leave him to die. I have to deal with this.”

I shook my head. “I get it, you don’t want to be an executioner. But the deal was once the Ra’zac were dealt with and Katrina was rescued, you and Saphira go right back to the Varden. I might not take my word as seriously as most of you, but I do try to keep it when I can. So onto the circle with you, I’ll deal with Katrina’s father.”

Eragon continued to protest, but there wasn’t much he could do as his Dragon refused to let him go and moved over to the teleportation circle.

“Right, here we go. Three, two…”

“I don’t think so. I didn’t say you could leave yet.” An annoyingly familiar voice said behind me as a streak of red whizzed past and hit the corner of the tarp Saphira was standing on.

I panicked a little seeing the tarp starting to go up in flames but managed to trigger the spell safely. In a flash Eragon and Saphira were both teleported to the Varden and I was alone with the newcomer.

I turned, and just as I suspected, saw a rather stunned Samuel standing at the entrance to one of the other tunnels going into the mountain.

“Bastard…”

“How did you do that!” He interrupted me. “None of you knew I was here. You didn’t move. None of you cast a spell, so how did you deflect mine?!”

Deflect?

I snuck a glance at the still burning tarp behind me.

Ah, so Samuel had tried to hit me in the back as part of his big entrance. Either kill or wound me, gloat about it, and then try and capture Eragon and Saphira. Only to miss because of the slight distortions caused by the bounded field I used on the tunnels to stop Eragon from running off.

I snorted.

Because that meant he was already inside and had been watching while we’d been sending Roran and Katrina ahead and deliberately waited just so he could make a more dramatic entrance.

“I didn’t do anything. You just have bad aim.”

“Liar!” Samuel snapped before he forcibly calmed himself down. “But that’s fine. Bring them back and I’ll consider sparing your life. Or don’t and I’ll just use you as bait. The Hero can’t just leave you to die right?”

“Well, can’t do that. Circle was one way only and even if it wasn’t the other side is useless now that this one is destroyed.” I said as the tarp finished burning. I wasn’t really bothered telling him about the ‘design flaw’ of the teleportation circles. I was the only one that could make and use the things anyway so it wasn’t like he would be able use the info for anything anyway. Hell, it might send Galbatorix down a rabbit hole trying to recreate what I did if I was lucky. “And use me as bait? Pretty arrogant considering how our last fight went. How’s the hand treading you by the way? I’m impressed you managed to grow it back so quickly.”

“Grrrr. You can’t use that laser gun without bringing the roof down on our heads and I know how you fight now. This time will be different.” He snarled, drawing a normal looking steel sword and pointing it at me.

“Yeah, you’re right.” I agreed with him as I traced Kanshou and Bakuya and leapt forward.

“This time I’m not running on fumes.” I snarled as our blades collided.

-o-

As much as I’d like to say I easily crushed the bastard, he was still putting up a good fight and he was right about me being afraid to use anything too powerful for fear of causing a collapse.

Of course he had the same issues to some extent. He couldn’t reshape the ground or use those giant rock summons like last time, but that didn’t stop his more insubstantial attacks like giant waves of fire and such. At least he did the few times he was able to get distance from me. Most of the time I was too close for him to attempt that without hitting himself.

“How are you even here anyway?” I complained as Bakuya cut a notch into Samuel’s sword while Kanshou glanced off his helmet. “Shouldn’t you be on your way to get your ass chewed out by the king?”

“You’re not the only one who thought about teleportation. If the elf bitch can move an egg across the whole damn kingdom, a couple dragons can move me here.” The bastard growled as he tried impaling me from behind with a rock spike. A trio of greatswords stabbed into the ground, forming an impromptu shield while I considered his answer.

It was certainly possible. Originally, the whole secret to Murtagh suddenly having enough power to rival Eragon despite being completely human was the fact Galbatorix had collected a number of magic gems that naturally grew inside dragons that let their minds survive after their bodies died and let them retain their magic. I forgot the name of them at the moment, but using a few of those as a battery to teleport a few days' travel by dragonback wasn’t a stretch.

He probably appeared at the bottom of Helgrind somewhere and made his way up after he saw Saphira fly out to hunt down the second Lethrblaka. But…

“Yeah? So what took you so long then? Galby’s going to be pissed you let his toy bugs die.”

I had the pleasure to see Samuel actually shiver at the thought of that.

“You– You bitch! It’s all your fault!” He snarled as he hacked at my leg. I jumped over the strike and stabbed down from above but he rolled away before I could land a hit. A wall of earth rose up to block the projected daggers I shot after him. “Eragon was supposed to be captured at the Burning Plains, if you hadn’t interfered none of this would have happened!”

So that was why nothing had changed even though Samuel had to have known about this mission.

Both him and Galbatorix expected Eragon and Saphira to be out of play, so there was no reason to change anything to try and trap them. Samuel had likely realized he could try and worm out of punishment by catching us all here and then fucked up out of arrogance.

“Well, good news then! If I kill you here you don’t need to worry about getting punished!” I taunted as Zangetsu made a brief appearance to demolish the wall before fading back into blue particles.

Hozukimaru speared through the gap and almost between Samuel’s visor, but he managed to block the spear with the same hand I cut off last time and deflect it at the last second.

“Bitch!” He snarled as he ripped the blade out of his palm and I noticed something strange.

His hand wasn’t bleeding.

Before I could question that little mystery Samuel surprised me by throwing the increasingly chipped and broken sword he’d been using at my face.

“Giving up already?” I taunted as I parried the thrown blade. But internally I was on guard for a trap.

“You wish, blonde bitch.” He snapped. “I know I can’t beat you with that trash weapon, but I just realized something…”

“You’re a dumbass edgelord working for the bad guys because putting in effort is hard?” I guessed.

“As much as I’d like to get some payback for fucking up my plans, I realized it doesn’t matter as long as you’re dead.” He continued as if I hadn’t said anything. “Also between the two of us, I can teleport whenever I want–” I flinched as the entrance to the Ra’zac’s cave we initially flew through collapsed suddenly, only the lingering fires from Samuel’s attacks giving us light. “– and you needed that drawing. So yeah, I can’t beat you. I can drop a mountain on your head though.”

As he spoke the entire cave shook and bits of rock rained down from above. He really was going to bring the whole place down!

“Don’t worry though, I’ll be sure to tell the Varden we’re taking good care of you somewhere safe. Maybe we’ll get another shot at Eragon that way.” He said smugly before vanishing in a burst of red light.

Something in the ceiling shifted, and then everything came crashing down.

-o-

It took me several hours, but I eventually managed to dig myself out of the rubble by chipping away at the rock while reinforcing my slowly expanding tunnel in a cage of swords. Once I felt the cool breeze from the outside air I was more confident in my digging and soon enough I was free.

I looked out from the ruined mountaintop into the setting sun.

“So…what do I do now?”