Red Brick Commentary

[mara_dienne459]

 And here it is, folks, chapter one of Eldest, the Red Brick. We're starting anew with this book (and the plan is to do the two other books, too). I ought to warn you that the commentary for this book is a little more opinionated than the last book. There's quite a bit we got incensed about with this book. Anyway, without further ado...

Chapter One: A Twin Disaster

 

Let’s begin by exploring the title for a moment.

 

You know, this is kinda a spoiler, as the Twins are the ones who orchestrate the “disaster” or Ajihad’s death and Murtagh’s abduction, but also, I’m not quite sure what the “twin disaster” is. Is it both a character death and an assumed character death? Because either way, neither are really disasters. A disaster is total devastation, where it takes a long time to come back from the incident. The Varden sorta recover very quickly after Ajihad’s death and don’t spare Murtagh a thought after he’s “confirmed” dead.

 

The songs of the dead are the lamentations of the living. 

 

And waxing poetic. I’m not even sure what this means, really? The living are the ones singing the songs for the dead, so they’re lamenting at the same time? This makes no sense to me.

 

So thought Eragon as he stepped over a twisted and hacked Urgal, listening to the keening of women who removed loved ones from the blood-muddied ground of Farthen Dûr. Behind him Saphira delicately skirted the corpse, her glittering blue scales the only color in the gloom that filled the hollow mountain. 

 

Wait. Women are here?! How is that possible? All the women and children were evacuated before the war even started! How could there be women here?! Unless they’re dwarf women, and then that makes sense. But that distinction is never made. Beyond that, unless the evacuees came back, which I doubt they did, the only people that should be here are those who survived the battle and the dwarves. Did Paolini forget what he wrote in book 1? 

 

Apparently it’s only been three days since the Varden and the dwarves fought the urgals for possession of Tronglebongle, but the battlefield still has carnage on it. Bloated, smelly, rotting carnage. Not that we’re told that, because that wouldn’t be romantic. It would be too real and gross. Anyway, apparently there’s way too many bodies for them to take care of in a timely manner. The humans and dwarves are being buried, but the urgals are being burned. Because apparently only the urgals aren’t worth respect and honor. Which is pretty shitty.

 

Since waking to find his wound healed by Angela, Eragon had tried three times to assist in the recovery effort. On each occasion he had been racked by terrible pains that seemed to explode from his spine. The healers gave him various potions to drink. Arya and Angela said that he was perfectly sound. Nevertheless, he hurt. Nor could Saphira help, only share his pain as it rebounded across their mental link. 

 

I really don’t get this. He’s got some mysterious injury that prevents him from doing shit, and yet he’s assured by the two best healers in this damn series that he’s fine. You know, if this disability of his had any point, that would be wonderful, but it doesn’t. It makes him “less”. Unworthy. Literally nobody likes him until the special magic is used to cure whatever malady it is that he has, and turn him into an elf. I dislike this intensely, because it sends the wrong message. 

 

Eragon ran a hand over his face and looked up at the stars showing through Farthen Dûr’s distant top, which were smudged with sooty smoke from the pyre. Three days. Three days since he had killed Durza; three days since people began calling him Shadeslayer; three days since the remnants of the sorcerer’s consciousness had ravaged his mind and he had been saved by the mysterious Togira Ikonoka, the Cripple Who Is Whole. He had told no one about that vision but Saphira. Fighting Durza and the dark spirits that controlled him had transformed Eragon; although for better or for worse he was still unsure. He felt fragile, as if a sudden shock would shatter his reconstructed body and consciousness. 

 

Whatchu talkin’ ‘bout, Willis? Changed him? It didn’t fucking change him at all. He’s still the same whiny jerkface he was from Book 1. He’s just gotten more stupid and whiny. Also, I love how he has to share with Saphira what she should already know, because they’re so “intimately linked”. It’s hilarious to me that they’re only linked such when the plot calls for it. Otherwise, they’re separate entities and only one is treated like a fancy pack animal, and it ain’t Eragon. 

 

And now he had come to the site of the combat, driven by a morbid desire to see its aftermath. Upon arriving, he found nothing but the uncomfortable presence of death and decay, not the glory that heroic songs had led him to expect. 

 

If you’re expecting to find glory in battle, you’re either a World of Warcraft orc, a Spartan, or a fucking idiot. Why do you believe everything the stories and songs say? Do you really believe war is this grand thing that you should aspire for? No! If the epics and songs told you what war really was, you wouldn’t want to fight! War is dirty, sickening, gross. Shit literally flies. People lose limbs and guts and it smells and it’s terrifying. Everyone who goes to fight in war fucking hates it. It scars you. It messes you up. Everyone is thinking the same thing “I don’t want to die. I gotta kill that guy in front of me so he doesn’t kill me. I want to go home.” No one’s looking for glory. 

 

 

 

Before his uncle, Garrow, was slain by the Ra’zac months earlier, the brutality that Eragon had witnessed between the humans, dwarves, and Urgals would have destroyed him. Now it numbed him. He had realized, with Saphira’s help, that the only way to stay rational amid such pain was to do things. Beyond that, he no longer believed that life possessed inherent meaning—not after seeing men torn apart by the Kull, a race of giant Urgals, and the ground a bed of thrashing limbs and the dirt so wet with blood it soaked through the soles of his boots. If any honor existed in war, he concluded, it was in fighting to protect others from harm. 

 

Sure, Garrow’s death showed him how sucky life was. Not Brom’s, not that slaver dude whose head Murtagh chopped off. Both of which he was witness to. But Garrow. The guy he found after the fact and didn’t even see pass away is the one who made him realize the brutality of war. Seeing people get hacked to pieces, meh, it’s only numbing. First of all, you shouldn’t become numb to it, that only makes you disregard life even more and find no value in it. That last line, too, fucking bothers me, because if Eragon truly believed that, he wouldn’t participate in this war Nasuada is about to start with the Empire. Because he isn’t protecting anyone when he goes and sieges a city or kills helpless soldiers. 

 

He bent and plucked a tooth, a molar, from the dirt. Bouncing it on his palm, he and Saphira slowly made a circuit through the trampled plain. They stopped at its edge when they noticed Jörmundur—Ajihad’s second in command in the Varden—hurrying toward them from Tronjheim. When he came near, Jörmundur bowed, a gesture Eragon knew he would never have made just days before. 

 

How fucking random is this? And how fucking disrespectful? He randomly finds a tooth and instead of wondering where it came from or who it belonged to, or hell, even burying it, he just bounces it on his hand like it’s a fucking marble. This royally pisses me off, because it shows that he has no fucking respect for the dead. Or the living. He has no respect at all, but he demands to have it. And no shit Jormundur (again, I’m lazy and don’t wanna do the special character) wouldn’t have bowed to you days before. You’re a kid who has no clue about the station he just inherited. Besides that, he’s only bowing to you because you killed Durza and survived and are a hero. If he didn’t show you respect now, people would get pissed. If you hadn’t killed Durza, none of this would be happening. You’d still be some punk ass kid nobody likes.

 

Jordy says that he’s glad he found Eragon “in time” and says that Ajihad is returning and he wants Eragon to be there when he arrives. The others are already waiting by the west gate, and they’ll have to hurry to get there. Sure they will. Can anyone else sense the set up?

 

Eragon nodded and headed toward the gate, keeping a hand on Saphira. Ajihad had been gone most of the three days, hunting down Urgals who had managed to escape into the dwarf tunnels that honeycombed the stone beneath the Beor Mountains. The one time Eragon had seen him between expeditions, Ajihad was in a rage over discovering that his daughter, Nasuada, had disobeyed his orders to leave with the other women and children before the battle. Instead, she had secretly fought among the Varden’s archers. 

 

In a rage, yes. That’s a good way of describing being thoroughly pissed off. I mean, I get it. He didn’t want her getting killed, and she disobeyed him and did it anyway. I’d be pissed too. But at the same time, just because Nasuada has a vagina doesn’t mean that she can’t fight. She’s willing to fight, and she should fight, just as it was stated before that “the only people here want to fight”. There should’ve been no reason to evacuate women and children, because noncombatants shouldn’t have been there in the first place! At least she had enough sense to hide among the archers, who were the more protected of the troops, as they remained behind most of the fighting! I’d be more pissed if she pulled an Eowyn and dressed like a man to fight in the front lines. Good thing there were no Nazghul about claiming no man could kill them, so we need that woman.

 

Also, why are you spending time hunting down the urgals that escaped? It’d make more sense if you just sent warnings to the cities and villages where tunnels exit, because chances are, the urgals are going to get lost and starve to death. I get why this happens - we gotta set up Ajihad’s death somehow, which is also meaningless and has no real impact on this story. Ajihad could’ve died in Book 1 with little impact, and he could die later in book 2 with little impact - but it’s so unnecessary. It’s really incredibly unnecessary.

 

Murtagh and the Twins had accompanied Ajihad: the Twins because it was dangerous work and the Varden’s leader needed the protection of their magical skills, and Murtagh because he was eager to continue proving that he bore the Varden no ill will. It surprised Eragon how much people’s attitudes toward Murtagh had changed, considering that Murtagh’s father was the Dragon Rider Morzan, who had betrayed the Riders to Galbatorix. Even though Murtagh despised his father and was loyal to Eragon, the Varden had not trusted him. But now, no one was willing to waste energy on a petty hate when so much work remained. Eragon missed talking with Murtagh and looked forward to discussing all that had happened, once he returned. 

 

This sentiment doesn’t last very long. Also, I hate this entire passage. The Twins go because of their ability with magic, but no one saw them do anything during the battle and only took them at their word that they bravely defended Tronjheim elsewhere without telling anybody they were doing it, and Murtagh goes to “prove himself”. How many times does this kid have to prove himself before people trust him? Like, the moment someone has to prove themselves worthy of your trust in a situation like this is the moment that person ought to say “Bye Felicia,” because no matter how hard they work or what they do, nobody is going to trust them. Murtagh has to continue proving he’s a good guy because the Varden keep measuring him by the stick that is his dad. That’s like telling Luke he sucks as a person because his dad, Darth Vader, blew up Alderaan with the Death Star. Like Luke had some hand in blowing up the planet. Neither Luke nor Murtagh had any choice in what their fathers did, and measuring a child by the actions of their parent is utterly wrong and reprehensible. It’s like you’re saying the child is the adult and should have taught their parent properly, instead of the other way around.

 

Also, I enjoy that Eragon states Murtagh is “loyal” to him and he “misses talking with Murtagh”, when before, he barely stood up for Murtagh against Ajihad’s decree for his imprisonment and he barely spared the guy a passing thought and became suspicious of him when Murtagh waxed poetic about Nasuada and how beautiful she was. There’s literally no relationship between them. If “being loyal” is “not letting this asshole die”, then sure, Murtagh’s loyal. But Eragon doesn’t reciprocate at all. In fact, he soon forgets about Murtagh and goes on his merry way crying about his problems.

 

As Eragon and Saphira rounded Tronjheim, a small group became visible in the pool of lantern light before the timber gate. Among them were Orik—the dwarf shifting impatiently on his stout legs—and Arya. The white bandage around her upper arm gleamed in the darkness, reflecting a faint highlight onto the bottom of her hair. Eragon felt a strange thrill, as he always did when he saw the elf. She looked at him and Saphira, green eyes flashing, then continued watching for Ajihad. 

 

First of all, what the fuck is this bandage made of that it gleams? Mithril? Bandages don’t gleam. They’re dull and usually made of linen or cotton which has no reflective quality. Also, Eragon seems to be having another “pitching a tent” moment here. Like every time he sees Arya, he gets sprung, but this is a young adult book, so we can’t say he gets an erection every time he looks at the beautiful girl who ought to take out a restraining order against him. Because this is disgusting and creepy. 

 

We then get a little bit of an exposition about how Arya broke the dwarves’ precious star sapphire, thus allowing Eragon the distraction he needed to kill Durza and win the battle for the Varden. But the dwarves are furious with her for doing this, and the only extent of their anger toward Arya is to refuse to move the pieces from where they landed on the floor. Arya never offers to fix it, never offers to help, never apologizes or tries to make amends. You know who does? Saphira. Saphira. The one who didn’t have anything to do with the breaking in the first place. And do you know what the dwarves do about Arya? Nothing. They do nothing. They don’t kick her out, they don’t demand recompense, they just glower ineffectually at her and talk about her behind her back, I guess. Anyway, Saphira and Eragon find Orik and talk to him, asking where Ajihad will come from. It should be noted that the group is standing five miles away from any exit.

 

Orik pointed at a cluster of lanterns staked around a large tunnel opening a couple of miles away. “He should be here soon.” 

 

I wanna know where this tunnel came from if it wasn’t one of the original three that the urgals used to invade in the first place. Because in Book 1, only three tunnels were described as being utilized while all others were collapsed or blocked. It’s only been 3 days since the battle concluded, and unless someone used magic to clear other tunnels, or they labored 24 hours straight and then some, those tunnels should still be blocked off. Also, why are they waiting so far away from the tunnel? If I knew there were still enemies running loose and unchecked, I wouldn’t take any chances. I’d be right there waiting, sword drawn and ready.

 

We’re told Eragon waits patiently with the others, answering random questions directed at him but mostly conversing with Saphira. There’s a half an hour that passes before they see any sort of movement, and they remain standing where they are five miles away. Finally a group of ten men climb out, then turn around and help out ten dwarves. Eragon sees one of the men raise his hand - Eragon assumes it’s Ajihad - and the warriors assemble in two straight lines. Why? This is like asking for a sneak attack. They should be ranged in a circle with their eyes constantly on the tunnel watching for something to happen. Ugh.

 

Before they went more than five yards, the tunnel behind them swarmed with a flurry of activity as more figures jumped out. Eragon squinted, unable to see clearly from so far away. 

 

And yet he gets fucking Eagle Vision a little while later in this book. Also, how did they not hear these guys coming? It’s not like urgals are rogues! They go “five yards” - 15 feet - from the tunnel before these guys ambush them. Like how do you not hear this? How are you taken by surprise? 

 

Those are Urgals! exclaimed Saphira, her body tensing like a drawn bowstring.

 

Eragon did not question her. “Urgals!” he cried, and leaped onto Saphira, berating himself for leaving his sword, Zar’roc, in his room. No one had expected an attack now that the Urgal army had been driven away. 

 

Are you fucking kidding me? You left your sword in your room? Nobody expected an attack because the army was “driven away”? How did the Varden fucking survive this long being this stupid?! Just because the army has been routed doesn’t mean some enterprising dipshit won’t come back to take potshots! You were attacked once, chances are, you’ll be attacked again. Go armed everywhere! 

 

His wound twinged as Saphira lifted her azure wings, then drove them down and jumped forward, gaining speed and altitude each second. Below them, Arya ran toward the tunnel, nearly keeping apace with Saphira. Orik trailed her with several men, while Jörmundur sprinted back toward the barracks. 

 

Seriously? Instead of blowing a horn to alert the soldiers, or having Eragon or Arya send out a mental call to battle, Jormundur runs back to the barracks?! Are you fucking kidding me here?! You don’t have a contingent ready and waiting for your leader? What kind of fucking army are you?

 

Eragon was forced to watch helplessly as the Urgals fell on the rear of Ajihad’s warriors; he could not work magic over such a distance. The monsters had the advantage of surprise and quickly cut down four men, forcing the rest of the warriors, men and dwarves alike, to cluster around Ajihad in an attempt to protect him. Swords and axes clashed as the groups pressed together. Light flashed from one of the Twins, and an Urgal fell, clutching the stump of his severed arm. 

 

First of all, blockhead, you shouldn’t have been at a distance that you couldn’t quickly get there if Bad Shit happened. Second of all, again, why didn’t they hear the urgals coming if there’s so fucking many of them? Third, why are you clumping?! First rule of any melee is get enough space as possible because space is going to very quickly become limited. Also, good job giving away who the Most Important Person is by ensuring everyone knows where he is. And isn’t Ajihad supposed to be this vicious fighter and a brilliant tactician? Doesn’t seem like it to me if he doesn’t ensure his own fucking safety and doesn’t fight on his own. Third, why would you just sever an arm, idiot? Use magic to kill the bastard instead of taking off an arm. 

 

Okay, real talk here. I do totally understand why it’s this way. It’s written this way so the heroes have no choice but to watch Ajihad die, and Ajihad has no choice but to die, so that he can clear the way for Nasuada’s ascension. Moreover, it’s so the Twins and Murtagh can “die” and be presumed such so they can be absent for the entirety of the story. Basically, this is a lackluster, non-imaginative way of ensuring things turn out just as the author wants them to. I know there’s a specific name for an instance like this, but it escapes me at the moment. The idea of this happening in a real world situation is laughable. Paolini here shows no creative imagination in making Ajihad’s death mean something, or even make it exciting to the point you can say “Okay, they tried.” This is just a lazy means of getting rid of some characters and ensuring that others are moved around like chess pieces to where they need to be. Personally, I think it’s disrespectful to the characters and disrespectful to the readers.  

 

For a minute, it seemed the defenders would be able to resist the Urgals, but then a swirl of motion disturbed the air, like a faint band of mist wrapping itself around the combatants. When it cleared, only four warriors were standing: Ajihad, the Twins, and Murtagh. The Urgals converged on them, blocking Eragon’s view as he stared with rising horror and fear. 

 

This is kinda vague. Like... is it actual mist that conceals everyone from view? Or is it a “swirl of motion like mist”? Based off the next line, “when it cleared”, I’m thinking actual mist? But if that’s the case, then everyone ought to assume it’s the Twins doing it, and when the only people left standing are Ajihad, the Twins, and Murtagh, they should assume the Twins used the cover to slaughter everyone there. I mean, if they had a brain. I’d even settle for an ounce of suspicion. But no. Everything that’s suspicious is ignored and they’re too panicked about Ajihad dying for them to think “Huh. Why is this happening? This is really odd.” 

 

Eragon starts chanting “no” as if that’ll make some kind of difference, and just before Saphira can reach the fight, the urgals fuck off back into the tunnel. The only thing left behind are the dead.

 

The moment Saphira touched down, Eragon vaulted off, then faltered, overcome by grief and anger. I can’t do this. It reminded him too much of when he had returned to the farm to find his uncle Garrow dying. Fighting back his dread with every step, he began to search for survivors. 

 

Oh, hey! A Garrow mention! Wow! Can you hear the sarcasm in those words? I don’t know why Eragon’s acting like this. It’s not like he had an emotional attachment to any of these people, and saying he did with Murtagh is stretching it for sure. And after everything he’s been through and seen so far, suddenly getting emotional about death is extremely strange. I’m not saying he should be desensitized to it, but definitely more accepting, as he just got done fighting in a war where death is inevitable, and he killed someone himself. Yeah, it was Durza, but he still killed a living thing. So get over yourself, buddy boy, because you’re about to embark on a journey of death the likes of which you’ll never recover from... if you weren’t a fucking sociopath, anyway. 

 

The site was eerily similar to the battlefield he had inspected earlier, except that here the blood was fresh.

 

In the center of the massacre lay Ajihad, his breastplate rent with numerous gashes, surrounded by five Urgals he had slain. His breath still came in ragged gasps. Eragon knelt by him and lowered his face so his tears would not land on the leader’s ruined chest. No one could heal such wounds. Running up to them, Arya paused and stopped, her face transformed with sorrow when she saw that Ajihad could not be saved. 

 

Wait, what the fuck? You can’t use magic to heal “those wounds”? When the same goddamn healing spell heals fucking Brom’s knife wound? When that same healing spell cures broken bones and killing blows and everything else wrong with a body? Fucking really?! But yeah, this is a thing, because we need Ajihad out of the way for Nasuada’s ascension to power. So of course he has wounds no one can heal. 

 

Ajihad whispers Eragon’s name and Eragon goes to sit by Ajihad. Ajihad gives Eragon some final words, making him promise that he won’t let the Varden fall to chaos and ruin and that they need to be kept strong. Eragon promises. Ajihad then dies. You know, I have to say, this kind of death scene only happens in the movies. Most of the time, the person is dead before you can reach them, or what you hear is really a “death rattle”, that is, air escaping the lungs as they deflate for the last time. That’s why there’s such things as living wills, because rarely do you get the opportunity to give a last speech before you give up the ghost. Anyway, Eragon starts experiencing some anxiety, and Arya comes over to bless Ajihad’s corpse in the ancient language. Then she says something about his death causing strife and that Eragon needs to do all he can to avert a struggle for power. She’ll assist where possible. Yeah, this doesn’t actually happen, because the new leader for the Varden is chosen in less than twenty-four hours. There’s literally nothing for Eragon or Arya to do.

 

Anyway, Eragon can’t speak so he gazes at the rest of the bodies, saying he’d give anything to be elsewhere right now. Wow, way to be an asshole. Saphira then says this shouldn’t have happened, and it’s an evil doing - because of course it is, because nothing like this can happen by pure chance, right? - and then she notices that the Twins and Murtagh are missing.

 

Eragon scanned the corpses. You’re right! Elation surged within him as he hurried to the tunnel’s mouth. There pools of thickening blood filled the hollows in the worn marble steps like a series of black mirrors, glossy and oval, as if several torn bodies had been dragged down them. The Urgals must have taken them! But why? They don’t keep prisoners or hostages. Despair instantly returned. It doesn’t matter. We can’t pursue them without reinforcements; you wouldn’t even fit through the opening. 

 

Oh hey, a “why” question! Wonderful! ...If dingbat bothered to follow up with it. Literally, no one ever asks why this happens in the course of the story. They know the Urgals don’t do these things, and Eragon has been told constantly that mages who are powerful enough can break into the minds of others and force them to do their bidding. But still, he doesn’t question this. Arya, who should know better, says nothing. The Twins abscond with Murtagh under mysterious circumstances, and nobody can be bothered to ask why or even be suspicious of them. This really irritates me. I can’t suspend my belief enough here to accept that nobody would question things that seemed fishy. I should also mention that if a body has been dragged, the blood left behind wouldn’t be in a nice, neat pool. It would be streaked in a clear direction. The only time blood pools is when the body is stationary, allowing the blood to collect in a single location. Forensic science for the accuracy.

 

Saphira points out that they might still be alive and asks if Eragon would abandon them. The answer is yes, but Eragon has to explain himself. He wants to know what she expects him to do, because the dwarf tunnels are an endless maze, and he’d only get lost. He couldn’t catch up to the urgals on foot, but oh, wait, Arya could. So Saphira says to ask Arya to do it.

 

Arya! Eragon hesitated, torn between his desire for action and his loath- ing to put her in danger. Still, if any one person in the Varden could handle the Urgals, it was she. With a groan, he explained what they had found. Arya’s slanted eyebrows met in a frown. “It makes no sense.” 

 

For a moment, I got hopeful in the fact Arya might question everything and bring to light what all readers must’ve figured out by now - the Twins are assholes that betrayed everyone in the most obvious way possible. But no. She says this, then simply accepts it as fact later on. “It happened. Get over it.” Literally once the journey to the west - I mean, elves - begins, nobody gives a shit about the events in the first chapter. Nobody cares. They’ve all moved on. You know what doesn’t make sense? That. That behavior right there. 

 

“Will you pursue them?”

 

She stared at him for a heavy moment. “Wiol ono.” For you. Then she bounded forward, sword flashing in her hand as she dove into the earth’s belly. 

 

And this is where Arya begins to give Eragon mixed signals about her feelings. Also known as Paolini’s interpretation of “playing hard to get”, I guess? Because she doesn’t want him creeping on her - and who would? - but then she drops one-liners like this? He asks her to go chasing after a bunch of monsters in the dark and she says “For you” like he’s the only one she’d do this for? If anyone else asked, I feel like we’d get a long speech about how dangerous it would be and that they wouldn’t likely find a trace of them now, or just flat out refusal. Eragon’s “burning with frustration” next paragraph? I’m burning with frustration how stupid and one-dimensional these characters are. 

 

Burning with frustration, Eragon settled cross-legged by Ajihad, keeping watch over the body. He could barely assimilate the fact that Ajihad was dead and Murtagh missing. Murtagh. Son of one of the Forsworn—the thirteen Riders who had helped Galbatorix destroy their order and anoint himself king of Alagaësia—and Eragon’s friend. At times Eragon had wished Murtagh gone, but now that he had been forcibly removed, the loss left an unexpected void. He sat motionless as Orik approached with the men. 

 

Oh you sanctimonious little weasel! First you want him gone and now that he is you’re upset about it? The same guy you barely gave a thought about until Nasuada reminded you that he was still there? The same guy you purposefully drove into a corner by not suggesting a way out for him, who you berated for killing an “innocent” slaver who would’ve turned around and killed you? I’m pretty sure you don’t treat friends the way Eragon’s treated Murtagh, not unless you’re intending to use and abuse them for your own designs, which, hey! Eragon did. He got his way and then Murtagh was an afterthought. Even at the end of book 1, it felt like “oops, better make this guy say something,” and Murtagh said the most assholish line in that entire book, all without any provocation. What bullshit is this, really?

 

When Orik saw Ajihad, he stamped his feet and swore in Dwarvish, swinging his ax into the body of an Urgal. The men only stood in shock. Rubbing a pinch of dirt between his callused hands, the dwarf growled, “Ah, now a hornet’s nest has broken; we’ll have no peace among the Varden after this. Barzûln, but this makes things complicated. Were you in time to hear his last words?” 

 

Really? How disrespectful is this? I know the urgals are the enemy, but really, Orik? Bad enough you’re burning the bodies in an enclosed space with little to no ventilation, but now you go and desecrate them more by frustratingly slamming your ax into the dead body of one? Really? And I like how he assumes there’ll be no peace among the Varden now. In a way, he’s correct? Since they go to war pretty much immediately following this. But at the same time, the efforts to fill the power vacuum are pretty tame, all things considered. It isn’t like the Varden gets split into different factions with someone trying to be leader from each. Rather, the Council that we’ve never heard of before convenes to pick Nasuada, whom they believe they can control, and whom everyone else agrees with just because of her dad, I guess? Like no one challenges her, at least until book 3, when an outsider challenges her. So really, it’s quite peaceful.

 

Eragon glanced at Saphira. “They must wait for the right person before I’ll repeat them.” 

 

What does this even mean? They must wait for the right person? That doesn’t make sense, not in the context of this moment. It’s not like Ajihad told him to take over; he told him to make sure the Varden don’t break and fail. I’m pretty sure you can tell people what he told you. I don’t think anyone would assume that— oh wait, yes they would. Because they’re all fucking idiots.

 

Orik asks where Arya is, and Eragon points toward the tunnel. Orik’s response is to swear again and then sit on his heels, whatever that means. I’m assuming he crouches and is putting pressure on his heels. Anyway, it’s not important. Hey, look, more people now come to the party.

 

Jörmundur soon arrived with twelve ranks of six warriors each. He motioned for them to wait outside the radius of bodies while he proceeded onward alone. He bent and touched Ajihad on the shoulder. “How can fate be this cruel, my old friend? I would have been here sooner if not for the size of this cursed mountain, and then you might have been saved. Instead, we are wounded at the height of our triumph.” 

 

If you were a true military man you would have been waiting by the mouth of the cave with a contingent ready to go at the first sign of trouble, or you would’ve run to Ajihad’s rescue and would’ve alerted the army a different way than running to the barracks to rouse them. So this is your fault, dumbass. Actually, it’s Paolini’s fault for setting up this boring convoluted turn of events so that the square peg was forced into the round hole, and everyone ended up in their positions through asshattery, rather than believability.

 

Eragon tells Jordy about Arya and the Twins’ and Murtagh’s disappearance. Jordy says she shouldn’t have gone - no shit - but there’s nothing they can do about it now. He’ll post some guards but apparently it’ll be at least an hour before some guides could be found for another expedition into the tunnels. Orik says he’d be willing to lead it, but Jordy says no because Hrothgar will need him. Why? And for what? Anyway, Jordy then tells Eragon that everyone “important” must stay in Tronglebongle until Ajihad’s successor is chosen. Arya’s just going to have to be a big girl and take care of herself. He says they couldn’t over take her anyway. Yup. Just like that, he dismisses her without even trying. And Eragon, the asshole, accepts that without bothering to argue about it. Because he loves Arya so much.

 

Jörmundur swept his gaze around before saying so all could hear, “Ajihad has died a warrior’s death! Look, he slew five Urgals where a lesser man might have been overwhelmed by one. We will give him every honor and hope his spirit pleases the gods. Bear him and our companions back to Tronjheim on your shields... and do not be ashamed to let your tears be seen, for this is a day of sorrow that all will remember. May we soon have the privilege of sheathing our blades in the monsters who have slain our leader!” 

 

He died a warrior’s death, huh? You measure that by the fact he killed five urgals instead of one? I bet those guys who killed six or seven in the actual battle must be feeling pretty put out. “We didn’t die killing ours and we killed more than he did.” Honestly... also, I feel like Jormundur is glossing over the fact that Ajihad was pretty much ambushed and murdered. Like this was just some random battle that had turned the wrong way. And then he says he wants revenge. Like... really? You don’t know who actually killed Ajihad. But you’re blaming the urgals because it’s obviously them. Seriously? 

 

The chapter ends with the warriors paying homage to Ajihad, then putting him onto their shields and carrying him off. We’re told many of them are crying. We’re also told Eragon and Saphira are in the middle of the procession for some reason.