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Before his father split his back in two, Murtagh was a loud child.
He remembered the sound of his small heels clacking on dark glass floors, giggling as he hid from the maids beneath flickering torches. And he remembered his mother. He remembered her as a moving curtain of inky hair, as the scent of dying flowers that had just left the room, as the lingering touch of cold fingers against his cheek. He could not recall her face. He could not recall her kindness, if she was even kind at all.
The day Zar’roc branded Murtagh with the permanent memory of misery, he fell silent.
Blood goes well with silence, Murtagh thought. It screams for you, red and angry, so you don’t have to. It aches like a father’s broken promise.
That night, Murtagh laid on his stomach in bed. His father had forbade any servants besides Tornac from seeing him. The older man wrapped Murtagh in soft cotton bandages after sewing up his skin. Murtagh’s eyes burned, but he had long finished crying.
“It will never be easy for you,” Tornac’s voice sounded like the crackling of a dying fire. “You will never find peace without a fight.”
Murtagh choked on the bile in his throat. Curling his fists into the bed sheets, he tried not to look at the red which was slowly tainting the white.
“I don’t want to fight,” he whispered. “I want... I want Father to love me. I want to be safe.”
“There is only one place you can truly be safe in this cruel world, Murtagh.”
Murtagh lifted his red eyes from the pillow to gaze at his caretaker. “Where?”
Tornac reached a gnarled finger forward to tap the center of Murtagh’s small forehead.
“In here.”
The blood on Murtagh’s back felt hot-cold and smelled like the forging of a sword. He felt his heart harden.
“Show me how.”
*
Before Tornac died, he was the only one Murtagh trusted.
Nobles were slimy people. In all his years living as Morzan’s son, he had learned that much. Every dinner was a swordfight, every ball a game of chess. He could dodge questions like blows from his father. There were two sides to every face and each sentence spoken had a secret meaning hidden underneath. Murtagh could dance. He could dance with ladies in dark red dresses and he could dance around the king’s compliments just as he danced around the tip of Tornac’s sword.
And in this way he knew nobody, and nobody knew him.
He stayed sheltered in his own mind, spoke only when spoken to, and escaped to learn from Tornac when he could. It was not a happy life. Murtagh knew this, but also did not know this. He thought there might have been once when he was happy. It was mid Autumn, and Morzan in a drunken rage had dueled the father of Murtagh’s potential bride. After Morzan had won, Murtagh had lost the suitor and was free to go swordfighting with Tornac in the courtyard. Riding high on staying unwed for yet another month, Murtagh felt an energy in his limbs like he had never felt before. He bested Tornac that day for the first time in his life.
Afterwards, when Murtagh pulled his teacher up from the ground, Tornac clasped Murtagh on the shoulder.
“That was impressive, son.”
Son.
The memory glowed bright as day in Murtagh’s mind, a fuel for monotonous years of shadows and hiding. Besides that, he did not have much to base the idea of happiness off of.
So when the king invited him to a birthday dinner years later, Murtagh thought it was just another step along the ladder of the life he was born into, the unhappiness that he had no choice but to face. Then he was ordered to slaughter the village of Cantos. And after Murtagh agreed, when he looked upon his reflection in his dressing room mirror, he saw the face of his father.
Tornac did not question him when Murtagh came to his room in a dark cloak, sword at his hip and arrows at his back.
“I knew this day would come,” is all he had said as he started to gather his things.
“You aren’t coming,” Murtagh told him.
“Blast if I’m not. I’ve been waiting to leave this hellish city since the day you were born.”
They slipped out of the castle and the night was theirs. At the sight of the city gates, Murtagh believed they could make it. They could really and truly make it.
But it was not to last.
Murtagh fought to the last breath in him. His sword drove through the chest of every soldier that stood in his way, their armor like butter underneath his blade. With a cry, he slit the last man’s throat. Blood splattered across his cloak and soaked his face. He did not revel in it. The smell had not changed since he was a child.
“Tornac! We must go!”
When his teacher did not respond, Murtagh turned to survey the river of bodies they had left in their wake. There -- a familiar head of hair, a cloak that Murtagh himself had helped patch. He knew what had happened without having to go over. The knife stuck out of his teacher’s back like a beacon, blade glittering in the torchlight. But Murtagh went anyway. He crumpled to his knees, his sword slipping from his hands.
No.
“Tornac,” Murtagh whispered, voice full of nothing and everything. “Tornac!”
Suddenly, shouting began to echo in the streets. Shadows danced across the walls of slanted houses as a gathering of people amassed. Murtagh stood in a daze, silence once again taking hold of his mind. Silence was better than armor.
He had no horse. He had no teacher. So he took up his sword, turned on his heel, and ran. It wasn’t until he collapsed on the banks of the Ramr, the sun rising red and terrible, that he allowed himself to cry.
*
Before Murtagh met Eragon, he hadn’t laughed in four months.
He couldn’t say why he’d rescued the boy. For that’s what he truly was -- a boy. He’d been looking for the dragon rider, that much was true, but he hadn’t expected him to be so young. The only reason he wanted to find the rider in the first place was because he’d expected him to be a... a leader. Someone he could look up to, someone who could teach him and tell him what to do. Murtagh didn’t want to help the Varden. So he couldn’t care less if a boy died. Eragon served no use to him.
But for some reason, he stayed.
When Brom died, Eragon cried. Murtagh watched silently and tried to feel nothing. He watched as this boy who was barely sixteen lost everything, just like him. Except not just like him, Murtagh tried to remind himself. Eragon had Saphira. He was bound towards the Varden. He had a young heart that still believed.
So they moved on, and Murtagh felt nothing. Nothing when Eragon and Saphira obviously and achingly cared for each other, nothing when Eragon talked of Brom’s friend in Gil’ead, nothing when he caught Eragon crying by the fire every night. Nothing, until...
“Spar with me.”
Murtagh looked up from his brooding to meet the rider’s watery brown eyes. Eragon still had the vestiges of childhood fat clinging to his cheeks and a sprinkling of freckles dotted lightly across his nose. His eyes were red-rimmed and determined. Murtagh sighed. If the kid needed to get his ass kicked to feel better, who was he to deny him?
Eragon blunted their blades with magic, and Murtagh stared warily. He didn’t like magic. Magic was the king, magic was his father. But Eragon was kind, and trusted too easily, so Murtagh was not afraid.
When he was finished, Murtagh drew his sword. Eragon’s blood red blade seemed to absorb all light. Murtagh avoided staring at it. The scar on his back burned.
From the first clash of their swords, Murtagh knew he had miscalculated.
Eragon met him at every strike, gaze hard and narrow. They fought furiously. The longer they battled, the lighter Murtagh’s chest became. Until suddenly he realized he was grinning as Eragon parried his remise.
They called a truce just moments later as it became clear that neither of them could best the other. Murtagh had never met a swordsman besides Tornac who could match him.
“That was fantastic!” Eragon’s smile stretched across his face. “You have to be the best swordsman I have ever met!”
“Likewise,” Murtagh said. “I thought there was no one in Alagaesia who could spar like that.”
Eragon laughed, a full and hearty laugh that Murtagh hadn’t heard out of the boy since meeting him. Something warmed Murtagh’s chest like a pint of mead. And before he knew it, he was laughing too.
Even after they rescued the elf, and Murtagh felt every bone in his body screaming at him to leave before it was too late, he continued on with the dragon and her rider. He couldn’t say why. The danger of it all, not to mention the fact that Murtagh would rather die than ally with any army, made taking Eragon to the Varden a terrible decision.
But he stayed. And every night they sparred, and every night Murtagh remembered what it was like to laugh again.
*
Before Thorn hatched for him, Murtagh told himself that he would never love another soul.
Love. Murtagh might have felt it, with Tornac he thought. That was how a father was supposed to be, wasn’t it? But even with Tornac he never opened himself up completely, he was never fully vulnerable. Murtagh guarded himself like he guarded nothing else. He was his own sanctuary, his own most prized possession. He didn’t dare to love another. It turned you to glass.
So Murtagh was accustomed to lonely. He grew up lonely and he continued to be lonely. This is how he survived the torture after his capture in the battle under Farthen Dur.
They cut him until he perpetually smelled like blood and until pain was his faithful companion. Murtagh felt cold in his cell when the skin on his back hung open, leaving his body exposed and vulnerable. But not his mind.
When it became too much to bear, and Murtagh was reduced to sobbing under the sound of his own bones cracking and the fingernails being pulled out of his body, he would retreat. Into the confines of his own mind he hid like he was a child again, unfeeling and unseeing, merely existing inside of himself and attempting to still feel human.
“Swear yourself to me, son of Morzan,” the king, echoing outside of time. “Swear it.”
But Murtagh did not yield. His mind was made of iron and his will of something stronger. And he could feel the king’s wrath in every blow he was dealt. But Murtagh belonged to no man but himself. If he didn’t have himself, he had nothing.
Then there were the eggs.
“I have a feeling, young Murtagh,” the king had purred. “Just a feeling.”
The torture stopped abruptly. Murtagh’s head stung with the swimming ordeal of healing, not just enduring. They did not feed him, but he didn’t care. They were no longer cutting him open, no longer hurling daggers at his mind. They kept him in a sweltering room chained to the floor. Above him, on a black stone pedestal, three stones were nestled in swathes of dark cloth.
Murtagh knew what they were. He did not want to admit it.
His eyes always gravitated towards the stone on the left. It was red, red like blood, red like the sword that had sliced three year old Murtagh into silence. It was menacing in the torchlight.
Murtagh didn’t know how many days had passed when it first began to shake. Delirious from lack of water or food, Murtagh thought he might be hallucinating. He tried to retreat back into his mind, but it was much harder to do without the constant presence of torture. But the egg continued to rock back and forth until it fell completely off the pedestal, cracking onto the ground.
The glittering red head of a baby dragon opened its mouth to squawk, mucus dripping from its jaw.
“No,” Murtagh whispered to himself, blinking in horror. “No.”
The dragon seemed to notice him then, and awkwardly pulled its wings from the shell. It crawled across the cold stone floor towards Murtagh, giving another pitiful cry as it came. Murtagh tried to scramble away from it. His limbs were weak and the chains gave him little room to move.
How had Galbatorix done this? How had he made this dragon hatch for... for Murtagh?
“Go,” Murtagh choked. “Go, please. I am not the one you want. If you choose me we are both doomed.”
The dragon blinked at him, large eyes the color of Murtagh’s stained trousers. It was so small, so helpless and beautiful, naive and looking at him. Murtagh forced himself to swallow, to keep his iron grip on reality. Every time he cared it had been ripped away or used against him. He knew without a doubt that the king would only exploit this poor creature at his expense. And through it, get to Murtagh. Murtagh belonged to himself. To no dragon.
“Please,” Murtagh cried as the dragon inched closer, unable to pull away. “No!”
The dragon brushed his head against Murtagh’s hand, and Murtagh screamed. He was lost.
Galbatorix was waiting for it to happen.
“Like father like son,” the king murmured upon spying the red beast.
Like hell, Murtagh thought amidst his agony, palm burning.
Galbatorix wasted no time in picking up the dragon, the small creature writhing and crying at being touched by someone that was not his rider.
“Pledge your allegiance to me, Murtagh,” Galbatorix’s voice slithered, his eyes promised the end of the world. Murtagh’s world.
“No,” Murtagh gasped, the word familiar on his lips.
With a snap that happened so quickly Murtagh barely saw it, Galbatorix cracked the dragon’s right wing in two.
The dragon screamed, a high and ugly sound, and his pain crashed into Murtagh like a wave. It was as if Murtagh’s stone walls weren’t even there. He felt everything, the dragon’s vast consciousness, the pain, the fear, the lack of understanding. And the gut wrenching, encompassing feeling of being alone.
“Stop!” Murtagh screeched, his voice a sob. “Stop it!”
“Swear yourself to me,” Glabatorix commanded.
Murtagh gave a drawn out wail.
The king held the limp dragon in his arms and snapped the other wing. Murtagh felt it as if it was his own. He carried the aching of two souls inside him, and it was more than he ever thought was possible. The dragon’s thoughts were filtered through his mind like honey dripping through cracks in a comb and Murtagh felt the blurring of their consciousness. He could barely tell where he ended and the dragon began. The dragon was his, himself, the dragon was the other half of his soul...
Galbatorix wrenched back the dragon’s broken wings and uttered a spell which drove a piercing agony through the poor dragon’s mind. Murtagh threw his head back and sobbed.
“I swear myself to you!” Murtagh cried in the ancient language, the words boiling from his bruised lips. “I am yours for as long as you shall live!”
The magic took ahold of him instantly. Galbatorix dropped the dragon to the cold ground where it crumpled in a heap. Murtagh longed for nothing more than to go over to it, comfort it, cradle it to his chest and carry it far, far away from here.
“Open your mind to me,” Galbatorix commanded.
And Murtagh had to obey.
The king was unforgiving as he raked his way through Murtagh’s thoughts. Murtagh could only go limp, crying and shaking as he was violated in a way he never thought possible. And when Galbatorix uttered his true name and Murtagh faced the horror of Himself, he vomited onto the floor.
When it was done, and Murtagh was left drained and utterly enslaved, he couldn’t bring himself to look at the dragon. He thought of the battles he would be forced to fight, of the killer that Galbatorix would make of him. He thought of the freedom he had only briefly tasted, and the laughs that he had only briefly shared. Eragon would not come to rescue him. He hadn’t in months, and he wasn’t going to now. Now, Murtagh would be forced to face him not as a friend but as an enemy.
He may even be forced to kill him.
A soft cry, the aching sting of pain. Murtagh blinked through the tears down at the small red beast that had been his undoing. The dragon dragged himself over to Murtagh, the both of them wincing at the strain. It let its head drop on top of Murtagh’s wrist shackle. He felt the warmth of the creature through his soft red scales, thrumming against his skin.
Their minds were one. Murtagh felt raw and terrified, and he knew the dragon felt it too.
Then, the dragon huffed a breath of smoke across Murtagh’s hand and closed its eyes. Across their bond came an outpouring of love. The blind adoration and devotion rocked Murtagh to his core. This time the tears spilling from his eyes were for an entirely different reason.
He was not alone anymore.
“I won’t let you live your life a slave,” Murtagh whispered to his dragon. “I promise that someday, you will be free.”
*
Before the king possessed his body, Murtagh thought he had born all there was to bear.
Every morning the sun worked its fingers under his thick dark curtains and Murtagh wished he never had to see it again.
He trained. He trained until his limbs shook and blood ran from his nose. He trained until Zar’roc was an extension of his arm and his mind could suck dark magic out of every word he spoke. He trained because he had to. His mission -- his purpose -- was to kill Eragon.
It was all he was good for, Galbatorix reminded him. A mindless soldier, pet to the king, sent to slay the blue dragon and her rider.
Murtagh bore the title with no shame. He didn’t know if he could feel shame anymore. The silence that had grown to be his defense was now his very identity. He did not speak, he did not complain, he did not want. Sometimes, it felt like he didn’t even exist. The only times that Murtagh could snap out of it and feel something was in battle. Then, everything was tinged with red and he felt powerful. He felt in control of himself for even the briefest amount of time. Killing gave him no qualms. He could not take his own life, he was forbidden in his oath to the king and he could never do that to Thorn, but he could take the lives of others.
Thorn. He made life livable, if only just.
The dragon was in constant pain due to the magic-induced growing Galbatorix subjected him to. But he never stopped being there for Murtagh. In the night, when Murtagh curled up against Thorn’s red scales and tried to remember how to breathe, Thorn would ask him about the World.
What is it like Murtagh? His hope would light up their fragile connection.
So Murtagh would show him. He surrendered his memories to his dragon like he would to no other. Memories of the Ramr River lined with snow. Memories of the Beor Mountains scraping the sky. Memories of the star saphire and the elves and Saphira and Eragon before they faced each other on the battlefield. Memories of his hope. Memories of Tornac.
They slept fitfully, knowing they could not live life how life should be lived. But at least they slept together.
Then came the Siege of Feinster. The bloodlust gathered hotly under Murtagh’s skin and he fought with everything he had. The old elf struck back just as viciously. The great golden dragon roared, and Murtagh felt Thorn struggle against him. Another dragon. There was another dragon. Where had this dragon and their rider been when Murtagh needed them the most? No, no matter. It didn’t matter now. Now, Murtagh felt his oath burning inside him and the urge to destroy too powerful to ignore.
So he hefted Zar’roc and cried out, unleashing what magic he had left in him.
It was not enough. He knew this. The elf was strong, perhaps not stronger than Murtagh, but he knew more. Murtagh felt his own youth and uncertainty in the face of the elf’s old gray eyes.
Perhaps, he thought as he weakly deflected the elf’s growing attacks, perhaps this was it. Perhaps this was the end. Murtagh followed the sweeping line of the elf’s sword, so close to his own heart. Perhaps he would get to die.
Now Murtagh, do not forget to whom you belong.
And then there was agony.
Murtagh screamed but his mouth did not move, he thrashed out but his limbs did not shake. He looked out at the elf through eyes that were his but not his and spoke with a voice that was his but not his.
Murtagh! Thorn echoed in his mind, but Murtagh could not answer.
He could not think. He could not move, he could not breathe, he could not exist. He had no body. His soul screeched in a desperate search for a home as Galbatorix used his arm to cut down the elf. Murtagh was vaguely aware of everything, and yet aware of positively nothing until he woke up blinking miles away from the battle, clutched in Thorn’s claws.
You are weak. Do not fail me again. He felt the king’s anger as he retreated from Murtagh’s mind.
Murtagh curled up and sobbed. He sobbed because he had a body again, he was himself again, and all he wanted to do was vomit. Thorn crawled over him and sheltered him with a wing. They stayed together and mourned for everything that they were and everything they had just lost.
We killed them, Thorn sounded like he didn’t even believe himself. The last dragon and rider and we killed them. I am a Dragonkiller. A bane of my kin.
And we must kill two more, Murtagh said.
They stayed until the sky grew dark and until Murtagh felt as empty as he could manage. The ride back to Uru’baen was still as the grave. They would not speak. They must face the king and the punishments for their failure. The only thing that could save them is the blessed gift of silence.
Murtagh clutched tightly to his dragon. In his quiet, empty mind, he realized he’d never buried Tornac. He didn’t even know where the body lay.
*
Before Eragon nearly killed him, Murtagh knew who he was.
He’d heard his own true name from the lips of Galbatorix himself, had known himself completely and utterly and been disgusted by what he saw.
When Nasuada was captured, and Murtagh forced to torture her, he felt something stir within him.
Empathy, Thorn told him. You are feeling empathy.
But Murtagh knew this was a part of him. He could feel empathy. Buried though it was, his heart still beat within him. He was enslaved, not mindless. Empathy was simply overshadowed by the bitter sting of resignation. For hadn’t Murtagh always lived for himself? He was his own sanctuary, his own reason to keep going. And when Glabatorix stripped his autonomy away from him the only reason he had left was Thorn.
This did not take away his ability to empathize. He knew that at one point in his life he had no desire to kill. But when everything he took for granted was suddenly and completely ripped from him, the beasts of Murtagh’s true nature made themselves known. He had always been a killer, it had always been a part of him. He had just never needed to. Not when he was safe within himself.
The king took his safety away. And Murtagh lashed out with a silent rage that only he could understand. For this was him, himself, all of him. Even the parts he did not wish to behold. The parts that were like his father.
You are good, Murtagh, Thorn told him. I chose you because your heart is the strongest I have ever beheld.
No, was always Murtagh’s answer. You chose me because I was alone, and you were alone. You chose me because I have my father’s blood, because Galbatorix cast a spell on you, you did not choose me because I am good.
Murtagh took the king’s punishments and attempted to ease Nasuada’s suffering all in silence.
And then he was facing Eragon again, and he wasn’t sure if it was Galbatorix moving his limbs or himself. Did it matter anymore?
They clashed in the throne room for the king’s amusement. Eragon’s face was no longer padded with childhood fat, his freckles had faded and his eyes were tall and slanted. For all intents and purposes, he looked like an elf. The set of his jaw was just as determined as Murtagh always remembered. And although they had sparred more times than he could count, Murtagh felt something different about this time. Eragon had been training, but he hadn’t been training like Murtagh. Murtagh had become a machine, a weapon at the king’s disposal. He was flawless. He knew this in an instant, and he also knew that he was a better swordsman than Eragon.
His vision tinged with red, Murtagh charged. He charged because he had to, because he was forced to, because if he didn’t than who was he? Their swords moved faster than lightning, wicked and no longer dulled by magic.
Then there was an opening, a split second opening... Murtagh took it, and it was his last mistake.
Murtagh looked up at his brother with wide eyes. He saw the pain there, and felt a share of his own. Murtagh dropped to his knees with a gasp, letting Zar’roc clang to the ground. He vaguely heard Galbatorix chuckle, declaring Eragon the winner. Murtagh looked up at Eragon, who still met his gaze. His eyes seemed to be begging for something. They were full and warm and Murtagh felt his heart begin to ache.
Why... he thought to Thorn. Why did he do that?
To win, Thorn answered.
But he hurt himself in the process, Murtagh stared, stunned.
Eragon does not live his life for himself, Thorn said.
Murtagh blinked, then blinked again.
“There is only one place you can truly be safe in this cruel world, Murtagh.” Tornac’s voice rang in his head.
And Murtagh had felt that. He had lived by that. He had taken up sanctuary in his own mind and never searched anywhere else for it. He had stayed silent, believing that speaking was letting too much of himself free.
In that moment, Murtagh felt a mountain shift inside him.
Thorn, he said. I think... I think I’m going to say something.
His dragon’s only response was a waterfall of undiluted pride.
So Murtagh opened his mouth and spoke. He spoke the Name of All Names, felt it ring from his throat like the truth. He tore the king’s wards away one by one. In swaths he ripped through them, and reveled in his screams. Master no more, king no more. Murtagh was Himself and whole and completely and utterly... free. As the palace came down on top of them, Murtagh knew Eragon was proud of him too.
*
After, he stood on the precipice of the world with his dragon by his side.
Where can we go, Murtagh?
Anywhere. We can go anywhere.