When he reached the base of the rubble, Eragon leaped as high as he could. He alit with a single foot upon the slanting face of a block and then jumped again, bounding from point to point like a mountain goat scaling the side of a gorge. He hated to risk disturbing the blocks, but climbing the pile was the fastest way to reach his destination.

With one last lunge, Eragon cleared the edge of the second story, then raced across the room. He shoved the door in front of him with such force that he broke the latch and hinges and sent the door flying into the wall of the corridor beyond, splitting the heavy oak planks.

Eragon sprinted down the corridor. His footsteps and his breathing sounded strangely muted to him, as if his ears were filled with water.

He slowed as he drew near an open doorway. Through it, he saw a study with five armed men pointing at a map and arguing. None of them noticed Eragon.

He kept running.

He sped around a corner and collided with a soldier walking in the opposite direction. Eragon’s vision flashed red and yellow as his forehead struck the rim of the man’s shield. He clung to the soldier, and the two of them staggered back and forth across the corridor like a pair of drunk dancers.

The soldier uttered an oath as he struggled to regain his balance. “What’s wrong with you, you thrice-blasted—” he said, and then he saw Eragon’s face, and his eyes widened. “You!”

Eragon balled his right hand and punched the man in the belly, directly underneath his rib cage. The blow lifted the man off his feet and smashed him into the ceiling. “Me,” Eragon agreed as the man dropped to the floor, lifeless.

Eragon continued down the corridor. His already rapid pulse seemed to have doubled since he entered the keep; he felt as if his heart were about to burst out of his chest.

Where is it? he thought, frantic as he glanced through yet another doorway and saw nothing but an empty room.

At last, at the end of a dingy side passage, he caught sight of a winding staircase. He took the stairs five at a time, heedless of his own safety as he descended toward the first story, pausing only to push a startled archer out of his way.

The stairs ended, and he emerged into a high-vaulted chamber reminiscent of the cathedral in Dras-Leona. He spun around, gathering quick impressions: shields and arms and red pennants hung on the walls; narrow windows close under the ceiling; torches mounted in wrought-iron brackets; empty fireplaces; long, dark trestle tables stacked along both sides of the hall; and a dais at the head of the room, where a robed and bearded man stood before a high-backed chair. Eragon was in the main hall of the castle. To his right, between him and the doors that led to the entrance of the keep, was a contingent of fifty or more soldiers. The gold thread in their tunics glittered as they stirred with surprise.

“Kill him!” the robed man ordered, sounding more frightened than lordly. “Whosoever kills him shall have a third of my treasure! So I promise!”

A terrible frustration welled up inside Eragon at being delayed once again. He tore his sword from its scabbard, lifted it over his head, and shouted:

“Brisingr!”

With a rush of air, a cocoon of wraithlike blue flames sprang into existence around the blade, running up toward the tip. The heat from the fire warmed Eragon’s hand, arm, and the side of his face.

Then Eragon lowered his gaze to the soldiers. “Move,” he growled.

The soldiers hesitated a moment more, then turned and fled.

Eragon charged forward, ignoring the panicked laggards within reach of his burning sword. One man tripped and fell before him; Eragon jumped completely over the soldier, not even touching the tassel on his helm.

The wind from Eragon’s passage tore at the flames on the blade, stretching them out behind the sword like the mane of a galloping horse.

Hunching his shoulders, Eragon bulled past the double doors that guarded the entrance to the main hall. He dashed through a long, wide chamber edged with rooms full of soldiers—as well as gears, pulleys, and other mechanisms used for raising and lowering the gates of the keep—and then ran full tilt into the portcullis that blocked the way to where Roran had been standing when the keep wall collapsed.

The iron grating bent as Eragon slammed into it, but not enough to break the metal.

He staggered back a step.

He again channeled energy stored within the diamonds of his belt—the belt of Beloth the Wise—and into Brisingr, emptying the gemstones of their precious store as he stoked the sword’s fire to an almost unbearable intensity. A wordless shout escaped him as he drew back his arm and struck at the portcullis. Orange and yellow sparks sprayed him, pitting his gloves and tunic and stinging his exposed flesh. A drop of molten iron fell sizzling onto the tip of his boot. With a twitch of his ankle, he shook it off.

Three cuts he made, and a man-sized section of the portcullis fell inward. The severed ends of the grating glowed white-hot, lighting the area with their soft radiance.

Eragon allowed the flames rising from Brisingr to die out as he proceeded through the opening he had created.

First to the left, then to the right, and then to the left again he ran as the passage alternated directions, the convoluted path designed to slow the advance of troops if they managed to gain access to the keep.

When he rounded the last corner, Eragon saw his destination: the debris-choked vestibule. Even with his elflike vision, he could make out only the largest shapes in the darkness, for the falling stones had extinguished the torches on the walls. He heard an odd huffing and scuffling, as if some sort of clumsy beast were rooting through the rubble.