antishurtugal_reborn | Red Brick Commentary (Reply)

Wow. Only 11 more chapters before this monster is finished and it's time to move on to number three. So close.

Chapter Sixty: The Maw of the Ocean

We now have a perspective shift, and we’re back with Roran. The ship has now found itself in the middle of a storm, because of course it does. Roran gets seasick because of it. Apparently even the seasoned sailors that Jeod hired to help them steal the ship are getting seasick, which is interesting because usually people who spend all their lives on the ocean either get over it pretty quickly or they become so used to the motion of the ocean that they actually get sick when they’re on land. Roran helpfully describes to us how it feels to be in a storm at sea, and he thinks how the storm might actually be beneficial to throw off their enemies. Apparently three sloops gave chase ever since they passed the Iron Cliffs, whatever those are, and rounded a place called Rathbar’s Spur, for whatever reason. Things get named and there’s no story as to why they’re named what they are. Anyway, the sloops are faster than the Dragon Wing and apparently are able to keep a pretty good chase on them. The sloops fired arrows at some point, and apparently the lead one has a magician, because those particular arrows were strangely accurate. They split ropes, destroyed ballistae, and clogged the blocks. Because of this, Roran’s decided the Empire doesn’t give a shit about capturing them anymore and only wants to stop him from finding sanctuary with the Varden.

Uh, how about them just trying to kill the bunch of pirates that destroyed the harbor of Teirm and killed an uncounted number of innocent people and stole a giant ship? Why is everything about you and the Varden, Roran?

Anyway, Roran says he had just been preparing to repel boarding parties when the Convenient Storm conveniently rolled in, and we’re told that Uthar has the ship heading for the Southern Isles, where the plan is to lose the pursuit along the coves of Beirland. There’s a nice environmental description of lightning flashing, and then when the lightning flashes again, Roran’s able to see the mizzen topmast of the ship crack and topple into the sea. Roran swings himself to the quarterdeck and, with some other guy, hacks through the cables connecting the topmast to the Dragon Wing. I guess the topmast then goes into the water never to be seen again, but we aren’t told that. What we’re told is that after Roran does the cable cutting, he sits on the deck, hooks an arm through the gunwale to hold himself in place as the ship drops thirty feet between a wave, and he’s hit full on with a wave which makes him very very cold.

Don’t let me die here, he pleaded, though whom he addressed, he knew not. Not in these cruel waves. My task is yet unfinished. During that long night, he clung to his memories of Katrina, drawing solace from them when he grew weary and hope threatened to desert him.

And this is what bothers me a little about Carvahall. They have these rituals and observances, but they don’t pray to any gods. They don’t believe in them. So what’s the point of having these rituals and observances if they aren’t to appease a higher power? And yet, here Roran is praying, except he doesn’t know to whom he’s praying. It doesn’t make any sense.

The storm apparently lasts two full days and breaks at some point during the night. The enemy sloops are somewhere near the northern horizon, and southwest they can see Beirland. Roran, Uthar, and Jeod meet in a small cabin and start going over sea charts. Uthar points out where they are now and their destination, which is the mouth of the Jiet River. He says that their food supplies won’t last them to reach Reavstone, wherever that is. He doesn’t know how they’ll get there without them being overtaken because without the top of the mizzen mast, the sloops are going to catch them by noon tomorrow, even if they manage the sails. Jeod asks if they can replace the mast because ships of this size carry spars to make such repairs. Uthar says maybe, if they had a ship’s carpenter among them, but they don’t, so he doesn’t want to let inexperienced people take a shot at it and end up getting hurt.

Roran pipes in and says if it weren’t for those meddling magicians, he’d suggest standing and fighting because they outnumber trained soldiers. Good idea there, boyo. Have a bunch of untrained farmers and shepherds fight a smaller number of better-trained, better-equipped soldiers. For once, Roran says he doesn’t want to fight because he doesn’t think they’d win, and he bases this on the fact that many of the Varden’s ships have disappeared. Uthar then draws a small circle around where they currently are and says that this is how far they’ll be able to go by tomorrow evening, assuming the wind keeps helping. They could make landfall somewhere on Beirland or Nia, but he doesn’t see how that would help them. They’d be trapped. They’d be hunted at the leisure of whoever felt like hunting them. Roran doesn’t like their options. It’s quickly turning into a “stand and fight” situation.

Then Jeod points to somewhere between Beirland and Nia and suggests going toward something called “the Boar’s Eye”. Uthar really doesn’t like that idea because he goes about two shades too pale. He says he doesn’t want to risk that. He’d rather face the sloops because that place has consumed twice as many ships that’s in Galby’s nonexistent fleet. Jeod says the passage is perfectly safe at high tide and low tide. Uthar agrees with that assumption, but it requires the most precise timing to get across without getting destroyed. They’d be hard-pressed to do that with sloops on their tail. Jeod keeps harping on the idea, though, and says if they timed it right the sloops would be wrecked or left to circumvent Nia if their nerve fails them. At that point, they could find a place to hide along Beirland’s coast. Uthar mocks Jeod a bit, good man, and says a lot of Jeod’s plan rides on “if”. Jeod keeps harping and says Uthar’s just a scaredy-cat and that attempting this won’t be any more dangerous than escaping from Teirm. Then Jeod questions Uthar’s manhood by calling him out on his fear of the Eye. Uthar’s like “you’ve never seen this”. Jeod says no, he hasn’t.

Uthar says it’s not that he doesn’t have the balls, but the Eye exceeds the strength of men. You know Charybdis? It’s that size of mega whirlpool, complete with the death and destruction. Then Roran chimes in and asks what the Boar’s Eye is because he’s never heard of it either. Uthar says it’s the all-devouring maw of the ocean. Jeod says:

In a milder tone, Jeod said, “It’s a whirlpool, Roran. The Eye forms as the result of tidal currents that collide between Beirland and Nía. When the tide waxes, the Eye rotates north to west. When the tide wanes, it rotates north to east.”

Except this is false. While the phenomenon is very true - it happens in the Naruto Strait in Japan every time the tide changes - the fact that it happens here between these two islands is physically impossible. What Jeod is talking about is a whirlpool that forms when high tide is going out and low tide is coming in. The two forces meet in the middle and begin to swirl, forming a whirlpool. But these two islands, Beirland and Nia, don’t have the positioning for this phenomenon to happen. Around the islands, the way they’re positioned doesn’t allow for that. What Paolini is saying is, the water between the two islands rotates when the tide is going out and in - thus north to west, or counterclockwise, and north to east, or clockwise respectively - but there’s nowhere for this water to actually go except around the two islands, and around the bigger island. There’s no room for rotation. If the tide is going out it just goes out, there is no rotation. Same as when the tide comes in. Studying the Naruto Strait, it appears that the ocean tides from the Pacific Ocean and the Inland Sea, are pushed and pulled at a high rate of speed, causing the whirlpools. They’re also safe enough that there are tour boats that take people out to see them. They aren’t as huge as this Boar’s Eye is. The biggest whirlpool is 66ft, which is hell of a lot smaller than Paolini’s whirlpool. The fastest in the world is in Norway, but those islands are also shaped differently. Either way, this whirlpool where it’s located is a bunch of bullshit. It would make far more sense if it was between the coast of Alagaesia and Beirland, such that the island of Nia is covered by the water except when the tide is changing.

Roran mentions that this doesn’t sound so dangerous, but Uthar shakes his head and basically mocks Roran for saying what he did. Jeod then feels the need to expand upon his previous comment.

“What you fail to comprehend,” continued Jeod, “is the size of the vortex. On average, the center of the Eye is a league in diameter, while the arms of the pool can be anywhere from ten to fifteen miles across. Ships unlucky enough to be snared by the Eye are borne down to the floor of the ocean and dashed against the jagged rocks therein. Remnants of the vessels are often found as flotsam on the beaches of the two islands.”

So Paolini’s whirlpool’s eye is 3.5 miles across (nautical league) plus anywhere from an additional 10 to 15 feet. Did he pull this directly from Charybdis? The largest whirlpool in the world is 1.9 miles long and 490 feet wide, and that’s located in Norway. The formation of the islands according to Paolini’s map wouldn’t allow for a whirlpool as big as the one in Norway, nor would it allow for the whirlpool to be as big as Paolini describes. If the whirlpool were that big, the entire island of Nia would cease to exist. And probably a good portion of the coast of Beirland wouldn’t exist either. None of this makes any sense.

Roran wonders if anyone would expect them to take this route, and Uthar says no way. Jeod just shakes his head. Roran wants to know if it’s possible to cross the Eye, and Uthar says it’d be a damn fool thing to do. Roran nods and says that he knows it’s something that Uthar doesn’t want to risk but their options are limited. He again asks if they can cross the Eye. Uthar doesn’t know, maybe, maybe not. He suggests one would have to be insane to get closer than five miles of the Eye. Roran then takes his hammer out and slams it on the table, leaving a half-inch deep dent. If that’s not a threat, I don’t know what is. Whatever’s in Roran’s stare is enough to make Uthar uncomfortable. Roran then says that he shouldn’t have to remind Uthar that they are where they are because they did what people said couldn’t or shouldn’t be done. He mentions something about Carvahall, about Jeod and stealing the Dragon Wing, and then asks Uthar what he’ll dare to do. Roran then adds some honey onto the threat of violence by saying that if they’re successful and live to tell the tale of how they survived the Eye (which they do survive, but the story is never mentioned anywhere throughout the rest of the story) then Uthar will be hailed as one of the greatest mariners in history. Then Roran asks if it can be done. For the third fucking time.

Uthar says he doesn’t know because if they wait for the Eye to subside, the sloops will catch them. If they don’t, they’ll likely be caught in the current, unable to break free. Roran asks Uthar if he’s willing to attempt it. Uthar finally says he’ll do his best. Roran then puts his hammer away and that’s that.