The Truth About Lies (An Inheritance Cycle Fanfiction)

The Conquest of Spaces

A/N: Warning-Long chapter coming up.

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Murtagh's POV

It's been two days since the battle, and there was still no sign of her anywhere. How could I have been so stupid! She had been right behind me, and then I let her out of my sight... This is all my fault! I'd searched relentlessly every day since I realized she was missing, but my efforts never yielded any results. This place was so huge, she could have been anywhere. And in the madness of the battle, who knows what could have happened to her? I'd run through every possible scenario in my head, and none of them were pleasant. If there were any gods-as she so fervently believed-I'd been praying to them day and night to help me find her, and that she was unharmed.

Eragon noticed my brooding and eyed me quizzically. "What's wrong?" he asked slowly, lifting his head slightly off the pillow. He'd been on bed rest for the past two days after Durza had sliced his back open. Although Angela had done her best to heal him, there was still a nasty scar there that mirrored my own in an uncanny sort of way.

I sighed heavily and knocked my head back against the wall. How could I tell him? This was the girl he'd been friends with all his life; that he was in love with! After a moment's deliberation, I decided the only thing to do was to just tell him outright. "Tabby is missing," I stated plainly. His eyes grew wide and he forcefully pushed himself up onto his forearms, wincing in pain.

"What do you mean 'she's missing'? What happened!" he exclaimed hotly, a vein popping out on his neck.

"Eragon!" I snapped, quieting him. "We cannot find her. She's been missing since the battle. I was right there with her. We heard the Urgals break the floor inside Tronjheim, and we were rushing to come help you. But she wanted to get some reinforcements. I let her go against my better judgment. This is all my fault..."

"What if...? What if she's-"

"Don't even say it, Eragon," I growled harshly, eyes narrowing. "I'm going to find her. I just wanted to let you know what was going on." He nodded slightly before laying back down on the bed and staring at the ceiling.

"Thank you," he said quietly, arms folded over his chest. I rose from where I'd been sitting on the floor, and made to leave before he stopped me. "Murtagh?" His voice had suddenly gone hard as stone.

"What is it?"

"You find her, do you hear me?" he said firmly, eyes ablaze. "You know what she means to me." I felt my chest tightening and I simply nodded before exiting the doorway into the hall. What she means to me too, Eragon...

~*~

There were others out on the battlefield. Women and children who had returned from the safety of the caverns, only to find their loved ones slaughtered. A woman wailed in a high keening tone, kneeling beside a boy who couldn't have been more than fifteen years. She watched me walk past, anger and sorrow clearly etched on her heavily lined face. Whoever the boy had been to her, they were clearly close. I hurried past the woman's discomfiting gaze, my eyes fixed firmly upon the ground where the light from my lantern shone.

The battle had been such a frenzy of action, I was finding it hard to remember exactly where it was we had been. Tracing my steps wouldn't be easy. I walked along the outer edge of the city, until I came to the place I was sure it was. When I got there, I felt my breath catch in my chest.

Before me was a wide expanse of bodies-impossible to gauge in the dim light-all piled one on top of the other. There were a few other people who were searching the same stretch of battlefield, and the despair on their faces matched what I was feeling. How would I ever find her in this mess? Taking a deep breath and rolling my shoulders, I stepped forward and knelt down, throwing aside the first body of many. The men and dwarves were easy enough to move aside, but when it came to the Urgals, it sapped my strength quickly. On top of all of that, the warm air inside the cavern was making it stifling; not to mention the horrid stench that was rising from the thousands of bodies strewn about the battlefield. This was going to be a long day...