antishurtugal_reborn | Black/Gold Brick Commentary (Reply)

Well, let's keep going. Let's see what Eragon's up to.

Chapter Thirty-One: Blood on the Rocks

Eragon storms out of a circular chamber somewhere deep under Tronglebongle and slams the door behind him in typical temper tantrum style. Because he’s frustrated. Why is he frustrated? This is why:

Eragon stood with his hands on his hips in the middle of the arched corridor outside the chamber and glared at the floor, which was tessellated with rectangles of agate and jade. Since he and Orik had arrived in Tronjheim, three days ago, the thirteen chiefs of the dwarf clans had done nothing but argue about issues that Eragon considered inconsequential, such as which clans had the right to graze their flocks in certain disputed pastures. As he listened to the clan chiefs debate obscure points of their legal code, Eragon often felt like shouting that they were being blind fools who were going to doom all of Alagaësia to Galbatorix’s rule unless they put aside their petty concerns and chose a new ruler without further delay.

What happened to the trust he was giving to Orik to run this show the way Orik saw fit? What happened him sitting there quietly and trusting Orik to know what the fuck he was doing? I guess he forgot about that, seeing as he’s getting super frustrated here that the dwarves are going through the formalities of this stupid meeting. Like Eragon has no clue how this works, so he should be just sitting there quietly and listening, but instead, he wants to take control and scream at them to hurry up and choose a ruler so he can... get back to killing people, I guess? Like honestly nothing has happened in this story to give anyone a sense of urgency, so I don’t know why there’s one here. Like where does Eragon have to be that this stuff is giving him angry anxiety? And I don’t see where Eragon is getting the idea that they’re being “blind fools” ready to doom the land by leaving it in Galby’s (apparently very capable) hands. I mean, so far, there’s been no evidence that Galby is bad for anyone. The Varden, however, have destroyed and murdered and have generally acted the tyrant.

Eragon begins to wander around the corridor because he’s “lost in thought” and barely notices these four guys that suddenly come up around him, which are his assigned guards. He also doesn’t even notice the dwarves that randomly pass him in the halls and greet him. Eragon is impolite and ignores them all. Instead he talks about how this Iorunn (and no, I’m not gonna do the fancy marks) is “the worst one”. This dwarf lady is the chieftain of the Vrenshrrgn clan, which is apparently a “powerful, warlike clan”, and she apparently has made it quite clear she wants to be queen and won’t be satisfied with anything less than a crown upon her head. She’s only got the backing of one other clan, though, but despite that we’re told she’s “demonstrated on multiple occasions” (that all happened off screen because we as the readers never get to see it) just how clever she is and how she can twist almost any situation to her advantage. Eragon admits that she might make a good queen, actually, but he decides she wouldn’t be a good fiddle for Nasuada to play because Eragon can’t figure out if Iorunn would support the Varden if she got the crown. He goes on to describe how awkward it is for him to talk with her, which I’m not sure how it could be awkward, really. He talks about how the dwarves consider her a “great beauty” and even by human standards she “cut a striking figure”. And she seems to have “developed a fasincation” with him that he can’t figure out.

Whatever that means. Does she have all the right curves in all the right places? Is that what makes it awkward for Eragon? Or is it that a woman is actually interested in him? Without him being a creeper on her first?

Actually it sounds like she’s having fun at Eragon’s expense, because he describes that she “insisted upon making allusions to the dwarves’ history and mythology” that Eragon doesn’t get and apparently amuse Orik and the other dwarves a great deal. Which makes me think she’s trolling him and purposefully making these comments just to see what he’ll do because he’s completely ignorant of what she’s referencing. All while everyone else is sitting there sniggering over the fact that Eragon is a complete noob when it comes to dwarven history.

Eragon quickly moves on from his uncomfortable interactions with Iorunn to describe two other clan chiefs that had quickly thrown their own hats into the race for the crown - Gannel (you remember him, he’s the guy who gave Eragon the crash course in dwarven religion because Hrothgar asked him to) and Nado. Eragon tells us that Gannel has a lot of influence because his clan, the Quan, is the one who deals with all things religious and has a lot of influence among the dwarves. Despite that, though, Gannel only has two other people in his corner. Nado, however, has more guys on his side, specifically the clan of Az Sweldn rak Anhuin. Otherwise known as the clan that hates Eragon for no other reason than he exists.

Eragon says something about Iorunn wanting the throne simply to increase her power and Gannel didn’t seem to be hostile to the Varden - though he isn’t friendly toward them, either - Nado is “openly and vehemently opposed” to anything Eragon just might be involved in. Basically he doesn’t want anything to do with Eragon, Nasuada, Galby, the war, the elves, or really anything that isn’t dwarf or dwarf-governed. Which, honestly, I can’t blame him. Look what happened to the dwarves in Book One. They let the Varden hang out in their secret city and the place came close to being sacked. They came to aid the Varden on the Burning Plains and their king was murdered.

And now that I think about it, Nasuada didn’t even offer condolences or expressed her sorrow for that in any way, shape, or form. Huh.

Anyway, Eragon continues talking about how Nado’s clan is the clan of stoneworkers who have no equal, because nobody is as great as cutting tunnels than they are. They’re basically the contractors and builders all rolled into one package deal. Oh, and apparently they have a monopoly on mining, too, because the Ingeitum (Orik and Eragon’s clan) are wholly dependent upon them to mine out the ore that the Ingeitum need. Eragon somehow knows that if Nado fails at winning the crown, some other guy will be quick to jump into his place. He specifically points out the Anhuin clan, reminds us that they were nearly annihilated by Galby and the Forsworn, and tells us that they pointedly made themselves Eragon’s mortal enemies when he was in Tarnag. We’re told that the clan has “demonstrated their implacable hatred of Eragon, Saphira, and all things to do with dragons and those who rode them” in every action they’ve performed so far. Again, we don’t get to see it. We’re just told it happened. We don’t even get a “for example” example of it.

Oh wait.

The example we get is them protesting Eragon’s presence at the meeting, despite the fact it’s apparently all very legal for him to be there, and forcing a vote to see if Eragon could remain present, and unfairly delaying the meeting another six hours.

Oh the horror.

Do you have somewhere you need to be, Eragon? Because I don’t think you have anywhere to be.

One of these days, thought Eragon, I will have to find a way to make peace with them. That or I’ll have to finish what Galbatorix started. I refuse to live my entire life in fear of Az Sweldn rak Anhûin. Again, as he had done so often in the past few days, he waited a moment for Saphira’s response, and when it was not forthcoming, a familiar pang of unhappiness lanced his heart.

Yeah, this is a plot bunny that goes nowhere. Eragon never fulfills the first promise because events basically work in his favor in the fact the clan is exiled so he never needs to do this, and the second is never explored because Eragon leaves and never looks back. It’s also kind of frightening that Eragon immediately goes for total genocide against these people, who really can’t do anything to stop him, without any sort of regret or waffling. He doesn’t think of any other option or consequence. It’s either make peace or kill the entire clan. Because killing that clan down to the last child is going to make the entire nation of dwarves turn against him, and he’ll be no better than Galby. You, sir, are an asshole.

How secure the alliances between any of the clans were, however, was a question of some uncertainty. Neither Orik nor Íorûnn nor Gannel nor Nado had enough support to win a popular vote, so they were all actively engaged in trying to retain the loyalties of the clans who had already promised to help them while at the same time trying to poach their opponents’ backers. Despite the importance of the process, Eragon found it exceedingly tedious and frustrating.

Mostly because nobody is paying attention to him and his wants and needs. I’m kidding, but that aside, there’s some truth to this. The dwarves are doing what they’ve always done in a time-honored tradition. To them, this is important and needs to be done as faithfully as any ritual. Eragon, however, is feeling the crunch of time. Any given moment there’s the risk of an attack or something that could happen which he should be there to prevent, but isn’t. So I guess he doesn’t trust Saphira to do the job? Even though Eragon knows how important this is, it frustrates him because he isn’t getting his way. He wants it done now, irrespective of what the dwarves want. He wants them to march to his beat, not their own. At this point, everything is out of his hands; he has no control over anything, but he can’t accept that. He needs to have control in this situation. Why? I’m not sure. He’s not in control of any other aspect of his life.

At some point beyond all this, Orik apparently found the time to tell Eragon (probably with crayons so Eragon could understand) that before the clan chiefs can elect a new ruler, they need to vote on whether or not they’re prepared to vote on choosing a new king or queen, and that this first vote needs to get at least nine “yea” votes to pass. Or is it the “preliminary election” that needs nine votes to pass? It’s the “preliminary election”. Did I... miss something? Wasn’t Eragon just talking about how the chiefs needed to vote on whether they were ready to vote on choosing a new ruler? So how can there be a “preliminary election” if they’re just voting on whether or not their ready to vote on their willingness to choose a new ruler?

This doesn’t make any freaking sense.

Eragon, in this confusion of a paragraph, continues to say that nobody feels confident enough to bring the vote to the table because... uh... um... well, this isn’t a vote about whether or not they feel like picking a new ruler, this is the vote on who gets to be the new ruler. Apparently this is the “delicate” part of the process, and it could continue for a stupidly long time.

Well, as Eragon is pondering this conundrum, he just continues wandering around Tronglebongle without a destination in mind, nor is he even paying attention to where he’s going. Too bad this doesn’t have any consequences for him. Eventually he finds himself in a random room where there’s five black arches and a bas-relief of an angry bear with ruby eyes and a sweet gold grille. Eragon asks one of his guards, Kvistor, (or Dead Dwarf Walking, considering what happens to this poor kid) where they are, and Kvistor steps forward. He’s described as being no older than sixty. So he’s a teenager in dwarf years, basically. He tells Eragon that these rooms were cleared millenia ago by Korgan (you know, the guy who discovered Tronglebongle) and that these rooms have mostly been left to rot, except when they’re needed to house people. Which hasn’t happened in... ever.

Eragon nods because he really doesn’t care (I’m projecting) and asks Kvistor to take him back to the surface. Kvistor says yeah, sure, whatever, follow me. So they head out and get back to the main part of Tronglebongle, and we’re told that they end up in the same hallway where Eragon and Saphira had first entered the city...

SEVERAL MONTHS AGO.

SEVERAL = 3

So Eragon went to Ellesmera and got trained, fought in the battle of the Burning Plains, sacked the Ra’zac’s home and murdered them all, tortured Sloan, killed an innocent boy-soldier begging for his life, and made it here to this moment ALL IN THREE FUCKING MONTHS?!

Are you KIDDING me.

No. Apparently we are not kidding you. The actual text says “several months”. Good. Lord. Why does it feel like it’s been longer than that?

Eragon experiences some nostalgia, or so we’re told, and he suggests that he’s aged “several years” between the time he first arrived in Tronglebongle at the end of Book One and now, somewhere in the middle of Book Three. I mean, he probably should’ve aged several years because it should’ve taken several years for this part to happen, but... time ceases to be a character in this story about the time Book Two starts up, so... yeah.

We’re told that this room is filled with dwarves from every clan. Every single one notices the Sue crossing their path, but not all of them decide to let the Sue know they’re there. Huh. I wonder if a Sue’s vision is linked to being noticed. If you don’t notice them, are they actually a Sue? Eragon says he apparently likes the fact that not everyone deigns to give him a moment of their time and attention, but it’s not because he still isn’t used to the fact he’s a celebrity or the fact that he doesn’t know how to deal with people recognizing him on looks alone, but because he doesn’t want to return their greetings.

That’s right. Eragon doesn’t want to be polite.

Then a bunch of dwarves from the Anhuin clan cross paths with Eragon. The Borg Dwarves turn their heads as a single unit and stare at him, but you can’t tell what’s on their faces because of the purple veils they wear. Apparently they only wear these veils in public? Then the last dwarf in the line hawks a loogey and spits it at Eragon’s feet before the whole line shuffles off out of the scene.

If Saphira were here, they would not dare to be so rude, thought Eragon.

I’m fairly certain they still would’ve dared, Saphira being present or not. Just because your giant disco ball cuddly is present doesn’t mean people won’t act like assholes toward you. Moreover, I’m fairly certain the reaction would’ve been stronger for her presence, because the clan also hates dragons, not just the people who rode them. On the other hand, it’s kind of telling of Eragon’s attitude that he’s got no confidence in himself without Saphira there to protect him from the meany dwarves. That, or he wishes she was there so he could sic her on the dwarves like she’s an attack dog. I’m not really sure which way it reads. Could be all of the above. I’ve never met a rude person who wasn’t rude to you just because someone else was with you. If they’re going to be rude, they’re going to be rude.

Exactly thirty minutes later, they get to the end of the hallway, and Eragon describes just how awestruck he is by this room, despite the fact he’s been here multiple times and probably shouldn’t be dumbstruck at the obvious riches contained in this room. I mean, there’s only so many times you can see the Hope Diamond before loses its impact and it just becomes a Really Big Diamond to you. Eragon goes on to narrate the dimensions of the chamber and how its decorated, which is the same description it was given when he first arrived here, and it’s irrelevant anyway, so I’m not gonna get into it. He talks about how the chamber has no ceiling and goes all the way to the top of Tronglebongle where the dragonhold exists. Another paragraph comes in to allow Eragon to remind us that there’s barely any daylight entering the place, and then has to drop on us that the elves call this place “The City of Eternal Twilight” because we really care what the elves have named the dwarves’ city. Because we don’t care. Eragon blah blahs on about this for a while, talking about flameless lanterns and where they are. This is all a lead up to describe the giant ass star sapphire that once served as the floor to the dragonhold before Arya went and shattered it.

Because of the promise Saphira made, the dwarves have been busy toiling away to get a giant scaffold built and begin fitting the pieces of the jewel together. Shards that they haven’t figured out where to put yet are sitting in labeled boxes. Three hundred dwarves are laboring over these boxes. Another group is on the scaffolding, building onto the structure and putting the puzzle pieces in their proper places.

Eragon watched them at their labor for several minutes, then wandered over to the section of the floor Durza had broken when he and his Urgal warriors had entered Tronjheim from the tunnels below. With the tip of his boot, Eragon tapped the polished stone in front of him. No trace of the damage Durza had wrought remained. The dwarves had done a marvelous job of erasing the marks left by the Battle of Farthen Dûr, although Eragon hoped they would commemorate the battle with a memorial of some sort, for he felt it was important that future generations not forget the cost in blood the dwarves and the Varden had paid during the course of their struggle against Galbatorix.

While commemorating is a nice gesture, and one I agree with, just putting up a statue or plaque and then forgetting about it won’t do anyone justice. If anything, it would just detract from the sacrifices that everyone who fought made. If you don’t use it to teach, then it’s just an empty honor, empty praise. Not that anything comes of this, really. Nor does Eragon ever think about the greater sacrifices that the people of the Empire are making when the Varden steamroll over their lives in their bid to rid the world of Galbatorix. Unsurprisingly, this is the only thought about this memorial thing that Eragon ever has. He doesn’t ever think about something like this again, which is really a shame, especially with all the suffering that he’s about to cause.

Eragon heads toward the scaffolding and nods at a dwarf named Skeg. No, really. His name is Skeg. This is the guy that Hrothgar tapped to put the star sapphire back together. Skeg waves for Eragon to join him, so he does, and we get a long description of what Eragon sees when he gets himself up there. It’s a giant crystal, guys. A giant broken crystal. So Eragon tells us that the broken gemstone reminds him of the river by his house, when it’s frozen in winter. While it’s actually a nice, evocative description, it goes on for just way too long. We have one long sentence describing every individual detail of the broken sapphire, and one really long sentence describing the frozen river. Then a shorter line describing colors. Anyway, Eragon asks how it’s going, and Skeg says it’s going. Can’t rush perfection. Eragon replies that it seems like they’re moving pretty quickly. Skeg goes on a paragraph-long rant about how what Eragon’s looking at used to be the bottom of the gemstone, and that Arya so kindly broke the gem into large pieces. But the top of the stone, what’s the bottom right now, well... Skeg says that those particular pieces broke into even smaller pieces. He talks about how the petals of the rose are the most important part of this whole thing (I thought the gem itself was the most important part?) and they need to get every piece of the rose petals back into its proper place. If they can’t, fuck it, might as well give up and make trinket gifts for our moms out of the entire damn thing.

No, Skeg doesn’t actually say “fuck it”, but that’s the gist of his giant speech about whether or not they can do it properly or not at all.

Then Skeg shouts at some random dwarf across the room and then asks Eragon if he’s ever heard the story of how the star sapphire was carved, in some random age we’ve never heard of until this exact moment. The Age of Herran. I wasn’t aware that Alaglag had Ages.

Eragon thinks back to the history lessons he had with the elves (what history lessons? Oromis made him read history books but he never taught him history...) and says he knows it was carved by some dude named Dûrok. And no, I’m not gonna give the u it’s funny little hat after this. I’m lazy. Sue me.

Skeg replies that it was this guy, Durok Ornthrond, which translates over into Durok Eagle-eye somehow, did it. This guy didn’t find the stone first, oh no, but he was the only person to get the gemstone out, carve it, and polish it. He did all by his onesie. Because reasons. He spent fifty-seven years on this thing, from sunup to sundown and probably even pulled all-nighters because he was obsessed. And I mean obsessed. He was literally convinced that only he could do the gemstone justice, to make it super beautiful and super special awesome so that all who gazed upon the thing would tremble and despair! - I mean that it “would touch the hearts of all who gazed upon it” and, oh, yeah, it would earn him a seat at the table of the gods because nobody in this book is selfish and does things only for themselves and what they can get out of it.

This guy was so obsessed over this thing his wife literally divorced him. In his thirty-second year of working on the star sapphire, Durok’s wife told him that he needed to share some of the work with his apprentices (and probably pay attention to her some) or she’d leave him. He blew her off. He literally turned his back on her. Whether she actually left him or not is up for debate as it’s not actually mentioned in the text, but I have to assume that she did. Because she doesn’t deserve the treatment he was giving her and nobody deserves that kind of treatment from their significant other.

So Durok continued to work on this thing until everything met his obsessive perfection to a T. He finally finishes and then he literally drops dead. You know, kind of like those gamers who spend hours and hours sitting in their chair and the moment they get up they die of a pulmonary embolism because of all the blood clots in their legs. Skeg says but of course the guy died because now that he finished his passion project, what else did he have to live for? I dunno, maybe his wife? His children, supposing he had some? His apprentices? You know those people he promised to teach a trade and is responsible for? Apparently everyone considers this guy a hero. I tend to lean toward the idea that he was a selfish jerk who became obsessed over his project to the point he drove everyone away from him and then bit it because he didn’t take care of his health, physical and mental. Skeg says they’re trying to reconstruct the very thing that Durok obsessed over until the literal day he died and if they can’t put it back exactly the way it was, then they’re going to tarnish Durok’s “accomplishment”. Anyone who sees the sapphire now won’t get the same “Ooooh, so pretty, would you look at that” feeling of astonishment as they would have if they saw it before it was broke.

It’s a giant fucking star sapphire. I don’t think anyone who hasn’t seen such a thing would be upset that it wasn’t in its original state. I’d think they would be like “holy shit, that thing is so big and pretty and big and can I have a piece?” Like a tourist. Buying a souvenir.

Eragon leans against this railing that comes up to his hip (was anyone else hoping he’d fall over it?) and watches five dwarves on the opposite side of the stone lower a six guy wrapped up in ye olde medieval construction harness toward a part of the stone, whereupon the guy pulls out a sliver of the sapphire from his shirt and sets it into place. This segues into Eragon asking Skeg that, theoretically speaking, if the coronation was held “three days from now”, would the star sapphire be ready to go? Skeg thinks about it for a while before ultimately saying that it’s not in the dwarf nature to rush things, and they wouldn’t be rushing even now, except for the fact Saphira promised that if they got it put back together, she’d fix it. But yeah, they’ll do their best to have the thing ready for the coronation and if it’s three days from now, well, hopefully it’ll be done (guess what, it is) but for safety’s sake, push the coronation back to later this week. They’ll definitely be done by then.

So Eragon thanks Skeg and he leaves. He starts wandering around again until he goes to a dining hall. He has a meal, but before he eats it, he tests it for poison because reasons. I think this is the only time Eragon tests his food outside of his training last book. Unfortunately, there’s no poison, so he gets to have his cake and eat it too, and then Orik shows up. Orik acts like one of those managerial people who knows he has to talk to a pouty employee but doesn’t want to and instead acts like a super-tired dad who has to have a chat about proper behavior with his kid. Rubs his face with a tired sigh and everything. Eragon casts some spells so nobody can eavesdrop on them, and asks if they’ve “suffer[ed] another setback?” Orik says, no, no setback, but the deliberations are “trying in the extreme”. Eragon says he noticed, and I imagine he’s saying it in an irritating, snotty tone. Orik shoots back that “everyone noticed your frustration”, and I’m honestly surprised that “your” isn’t italicized for emphasis. Anyway, Orik tells Eragon that he needs to control himself better from now on, mostly because revealing weakness of any kind to their enemies isn’t going to do anything but justify their attitudes. He shuts up as a chef-dwarf walks up and puts a plate of food onto the table in front of him.

Eragon whines about the whole thing, asking if Orik’s any closer to winning the throne and if they’ve gained any ground with “all of this long-winded prattle”. Orik says they’ve gained a great deal. After Eragon temper-tantrumed off, Havard agreed to lower his salt tax on the Ingeitum in exchange for summer hunting rights in Ingeitum lands. Eragon spits on this because the world isn’t revolving around him and his wants, and complains that none of what Orik just talked about has anything to do with succeeding Hrothgar as king. He then demands Orik “be honest” with him and tell him what his position is compared with the other clan leaders, how long is this going to take, and then he complains that with each day that passes, the more likely it is for Galby to get wise and attack via Thorn and Murtagh.

And I laugh because none of that is remotely even a thought in your author’s mind. It’s just there as a “what if” but it never actually happens.

Orik uses the tablecloth to wipe his mouth (what, did they run out of napkins? or was this really a thing they did?) and says that his position “is sound enough” and that nobody has enough support to call a vote. He and Nado have the biggest followings, and if either of them can win over another two or three clans, then they’ll win the contest. Havard is wavering, so it won’t take too much more to get him into Orik’s camp. They’ll have dinner with him tonight and Orik will attempt to grease some palms. As for when the meet will end, well, that could be another week away. Maybe two. Eragon doesn’t like that news. He apparently doesn’t like it so much that he gets so tense that he’s going to puke up his lunch. Orik reaches across the table and grasps Eragon’s wrist. He says that there’s nothing either of them to make things go faster, so don’t be upset, yeah? He tells Eragon to worry about what he can change (italics mine) and let the rest figure itself out. Eragon says he knows but they just are on a very tight schedule here. Orik says “what will be will be” and “no one can escape fate’s design”.

Fate pops up a lot in these books. It doesn’t actually affect anything.

In response, Eragon says:

“Couldn’t you seize the throne by force? I know you don’t have that many troops in Tronjheim, but with my support, who could stand against you?”

I can understand why Eragon’s so impatient. Because every minute he spends having out here with the dwarves is another minute closer to the fact that he’s missing being discovered. The closer an attack may come. So he’s really wanting to get back to where he’s needed the most, because he certainly isn’t doing anyone any good here. However, I feel like Eragon’s impatience isn’t born of his desire to get back as soon as possible so he can protect anyone or help in the effort, but because these talks aren’t going as fast as he wants them to, and he finds the whole thing frustrating. The fact that he feels the need to mention using force is really telling, because that’s his go-to for anything that frustrates him. He uses violence to get where he wants to go and to get what he wants, period. This isn’t something a hero should be doing, let alone advocating. Eragon wants things to go his way, and he doesn’t care who he has to step on in order to get there.

Orik, who had resumed eating by this time, stops with the knife halfway between his plate and his mouth. Why the knife? Don’t they have forks? Anyway, he says that doing such a thing would be a really bad idea. Eragon, the dimwit, has to ask why. Orik gets exasperated in the fact that he has to explain this to the Oblivious Overlord, and says that the entirety of the dwarven race would turn against them, and instead of seizing control of the nation, Orik would get an empty title and civil war. They’d all be dead within a year. Eragon’s response is “Ah”.

...Really.

“Ah.”

“Ah” is not the appropriate response to basically being told civil war will break out and they’ll all die if they decide to use force to get what they want. But considering that Eragon has the powers to rival a minor god, I suppose it makes sense. When he’s about to lose, he whines that it’s not fair, and the Deux ex Machina fairy swoops in to change things in his favor. Deus ex Machina fairy needs to up their rates. Maybe unionize. The poor thing gets abused too much in this story.

Orik says nothing more until he’s finished stuffing his face and has washed it all down with beer. After he lets out a loud belch, because why not that’s polite, right?, he continues the conversation by comparing their position to being upon a “windy mountain path with a mile-high drop on either side.” In other words, they’re up shit creek and are about to lose hold on their paddle. He reiterates that a lot of dwarves hate and fear Dragon Riders because of what Galby did to them, along with the Forsworn and now Murtagh. And a lot of them fear the world beyond the mountains. Both of which are reasonable - they were more or less annihilated (one clan very near to extinction) by Galby and the Forsworn, and Eragon hasn’t shown himself to be very attentive to their needs either; and many people fear the unknown, especially if they haven’t traveled more than 100 miles away from their house. In medieval times, people were lucky if they moved to the next village over from theirs, but most of the time, they lived right in the same village where they were born. Orik continues to say that Nado and the Anhuin clan are being pretty antagonistic on this front. They’re playing on people’s fears and turning them against Eragon, the Varden, and even King Orrin. Somehow the Anhuin clan is “the epitome” of what they need to overcome if Orik is to get the crown.

Spoiler alert, they don’t actually “overcome” the clan at all. They effectively cancel the clan and write them out of history. Apparently cancel culture can exist in books. Although I don’t think the nomenclature existed until more recently.

Orik continues to say that they need to find some way to “allay their concerns and the concerns of those like them” because, if he becomes king, he’s going to have to listen to those concerns and do something about them. A king or queen is at the mercy of the clans, apparently, no matter how strong they might be. Eragon asks if there’s anything he could do, a custom or ceremony, that would make the Anhuin clan like him and make them be his bestest of friends? There has to be something he could do!

Orik laughs at him and tells him to die.

Wow. Orik. That’s... pretty cold, actually. I’m sure it’s meant to be funny, like a joke at Eragon’s expense, but that’s pretty cruel. Especially because we already know the Anhuin clan is gunning for Eragon and they’re going to do whatever it takes to make sure anyone and anything associated with Eragon is taken out.

And now that I think about it, it could also be foreshadowing, considering what happens shortly.

So we have a timeskip, and we rejoin our morons the next morning. Eragon’s sitting in on the meeting again but this time is doing his best to act as bored as possible. There’s a whole paragraph to describe the room, who’s in the room, and actually doesn’t describe Eragon’s state of mind. I know he’s bored because it says so in two paragraphs.

But before we get there, we’re told that Gáldhiem (I keep wanting to write “heim”) is blathering on. We’re told what he looks like: he’s short, just about two feet tall, has a really long beard. That’s it for description. The poor guy has to stand on his chair so he can soapbox. He’s screaming in dwarvish, and Eragon’s translator (because Eragon gets one of those, remember? he never bothered to try and learn the language for himself) says that Galdhiem won’t let “that” happen (no, we never find out what “that” is) and that he won’t let the Varden fuck up their country. The Dragon War left the dwarves weak and...

And anything more interesting gets cut off by Eragon being bored.

Eragon stifled a yawn, bored. He allowed his gaze to drift around the granite table, from Gáldhiem to Nado, a round-faced dwarf with flaxen hair who was nodding with approval at Gáldhiem’s thundering speech; to Havard, who was using a dagger to clean under the fingernails of the two remaining fingers on his right hand; to Vermûnd, heavy-browed but otherwise inscrutable behind his purple veil; to Gannel and Ûndin, who sat leaning toward each other, whispering, while Hadfala, an elderly dwarf woman who was the clan chief of Dûrgrimst Ebardac and the third member of Gannel’s alliance, frowned at the sheaf of rune-covered parchment she brought with her to every meeting; and then to the chief of Dûrgrimst Ledwonnû, Manndrâth, who sat in profile to Eragon, displaying his long, drooping nose to good effect; to Thordris, grimstborith of Dûrgrimst Nagra, of whom he could see little but her wavy auburn hair, which fell past her shoulders and lay coiled on the floor in a braid twice as long as she was tall; to the back of Orik’s head as he slouched to one side in his chair; to Freowin, grimstborith of Dûrgrimst Gedthrall, an immensely corpulent dwarf who kept his eyes fixed upon the block of wood he was busy carving into the likeness of a hunched raven; and then to Hreidamar, grimstborith of Dûrgrimst Urzhad, who, in contrast with Freowin, was fit and compact, with corded forearms, and who wore a mail hauberk and helm to every gathering; and finally to Íorûnn, she of the nut-brown skin marred only by a thin, crescent-shaped scar high upon her left cheekbone, she of the satin-bright hair bound underneath a silver helm wrought in the shape of a snarling wolf’s head, she of the vermilion dress and the necklace of flashing emeralds set in squares of gold carved with lines of arcane runes.

Well, we can definitely tell Eragon had an attitude adjustment between the chapter break and now. He’s bored instead of angry. He’s basically surrounded by enemies and he’s bored. Well, if that’s not confidence becoming of a villain, I don’t know what is. And it’s interesting to me that all the clan chiefs get described, but Iorunn is the only one that gets a paragraph’s worth of run-on sentences to describe her. I don’t know why she merits such description and the others don’t. But I guess Eragon isn’t bored enough not to pay attention to Iorunn, based on the description she gets. And he’s not bored enough to not pay attention to what everyone else is wearing, either.

Iorunn happens to notice Eragon’s staring at her, so she winks at him. With “voluptuous ease”. ...Right. That’s not just a little creepy. Eragon blushes because of this and I’m asking why. He’s not interested in her. He’s just staring at her. Her winking at him should cause him to blink at her and then look away with precise dismissal. Or at the very least, look away with the embarrassment that he was caught staring, like an “oh shit, she caught me”. Not blush. So he looks back at Galdhiem and describes him as a “strutting pigeon”. How many “strutting pigeons” have you seen, Eragon? Seriously.

Now we’re told that the whole reason Eragon is playing bored is because Orik told him not to react to anything. Be impassive. Eventually they stop for lunch and Eragon hustles over to Orik to tell him that he can’t stand sitting there quiet anymore so he’s going to go explore. Orik says yeah, okay, whatever, be back by dinner time. Orik is obviously distracted by something, but we don’t know by what. Foreshadowing hitting him upside the head, maybe? Anyway, Eragon heads off, not paying attention to where he’s going. He instead focuses on trying to figure out ways he can make the clans play nice with each other and then use them against Galby. No, really. That’s exactly what he’s considering. Unfortunately, any idea he’s come up with is apparently “far-fetched” enough that none of them will ever work. While Eragon is also working on getting himself hopelessly lost, he tells us he’s confident that Kvistor - one of his bodyguards - can get him back to where he needs to be, no sweat.

Real hero, this kid.

Oh, and Eragon’s also use his mind-rapey powers to keep track of every living creature within several hundred feet of him, basically because he doesn’t want to be caught unawares by anyone who’s trying to seek him out. Keep this in mind for a little later. When he finally stops, he’s in the same room he was earlier, the one with the bear bas relief. He briefly wonders what brought him back and the answer is authorial fiat. This room literally serves no purpose other than because reasons, I guess. Eventually he goes to another path in the chamber and yells “hello” to get his echo back. Then he asks Kvistor if anyone lives here. Kvistor says a few do, yeah. A few who like to be alone. Specifically he says “those to whom empty solitude is more pleasing than the touch of their wife’s hand or the sound of their friends’ voices”. What if they don’t have a wife? Or a husband? What if they don’t have any friends? What if they’re agoraphobic? What if they’re anti-social loners? What if they’re hikikomori (Japanese term for a shut-in)? Anyway, someone doesn’t need to have these particular qualifiers Kvistor names to be one of these tunnel-dwellers, either. Case in point, he says that sometimes they banish people to these tunnels on pain of death for a predetermined number of years or in permanent exile.

Basically they shun, shun, shuuuun, the non-believer. And if these particular shunned individuals pop back up, they get executed.

Oh, and by the way, such a deep-dweller dwarf was one who warned the Varden the Urgals were coming way back in Book One. Which is a total retcon, because there, the dwarf claimed he was from a city called Orthiad, which the dwarves had left abandoned for years or so Orik claimed. Now, it’s possible that this dwarf was living in the abandoned city, but then if someone’s living in it, it wouldn’t be an abandoned city, now would it? And if this dwarf wasn’t one of those anti-social people who just wanted to live away from society, and instead was a criminal, then the guy literally risked his life to warn the Varden and Hrothgar that the Urgal army was on the way. Worse, he might not have been believed if he had been a criminal and was being shunned. Because, as we find out later, if you’re shunned by the dwarves, you literally cease to exist.

Anyway, as soon as Kvistor finishes his speech, Eragon just says he’s ready to go back. Yeah, he literally has no reaction to this story at all, not even an “ah, that’s neat” to being told deep-dweller dwarves exist and one literally saved Eragon’s ass when he could’ve been risking his life to do it.

Okay, you remember what I told you to remember? That Eragon was doing his mind-rapey thing so that he wouldn’t be taken by surprise? Okay. Good. Because this is what happens next: Kvistor and co leads Eragon out of the doorway and they go “no more than twenty feet” when Eragon hears a tap-tap-tapping at his chamber door. Not really. He hears a scuffing sound, and tells us that it’s so faint even Kvistor doesn’t notice. Or maybe he did, and just ignored it as the sound of shifting rock. We don’t know, because this is all about Eragon. And Kvistor is Dead Man Walking.

Eragon looks behind him and he sees seven dwarves dressed entirely in black, complete with face masks and booties, rushing toward their group with a speed that Eragon assures us readers is “the sole province of elves, Shades, and other creatures whose blood hummed with magic”. Sooooo elfified Riders? Anyway, he hasn’t at this point in time realized he CAN’T READ THEIR MINDS. He hasn’t figured out that he couldn’t sense them coming, despite having his mind-rape shit going full tilt. Do you know when that realization comes? The very last sentence of the paragraph describing these assassins. In the meantime, he’s described what they’re wearing and their weapons. Specifically each dwarf is carrying a dagger with a “pale blade that flickered with prismatic colors”. So obviously bad news. They’re also carrying metal bucklers with a spike protruding from them. Does Eragon start slinging around shielding spells to counteract whatever these dwarves might have? No. Does he unsheathe his own weapon in preparation to fight them? No. Does he warn his guards that danger is approaching? Big fat no.

He instead calls for Saphira despite the fact he’s been without her for several days. And he knows this.

His instinct to incoming danger is to scream for his dragon so she can put herself at risk to save his ass.

Well, instead of shouting a warning as he sees these assassin’s coming, he instead whirls around to face them, while reaching for his falchion, and only then opens his mouth to start shouting a warning. Except, obviously, he’s too late.

As the first word rang in his throat, three of the strange dwarves grabbed the hindmost of Eragon’s guards and lifted their glimmering daggers to stab him. Faster than speech or conscious thought, Eragon plunged his whole being into the flow of magic and, without relying upon the ancient language to structure his spell, rewove the fabric of the world into a pattern more pleasing to him. The three guards who stood between him and the attackers flew toward him, as if yanked by invisible strings, and landed upon their feet beside him, unharmed but disoriented.

And again the rules of magic are broken for our hero. Eragon, for some inexplicable reason, is suddenly able to use wordless magic to remake the world as he sees fit. He doesn’t want the guards to die? Why, all he has to do is use magic to reweave the world the way he wants and voila! No dead guards. Considering there isn’t an instance before where Eragon uses magic like this, it seems like it’s coming out of nowhere. It feels like a deus ex machina, especially when there isn’t really another instance where Eragon does something like this in the story, unless you count the very end where he makes Galby commit suicide. But doing it here, out of nowhere with no previous context, makes it seem very weird, and that line where it says “rewove the fabric of the world into a pattern more pleasing to him” makes it sounds as if he can manipulate things at will to his own specifications. That he can change things he doesn’t like into something that will make his life better, if not easier. Nobody else has this ability. This makes me feel like Eragon is a god and can do whatever he wants, rather than a mortal with special powers.

There’s a sudden decrease to his strength because of it, yet Eragon’s reaction is to wince. Then two of the assassins rush Eragon, stabbing at his belly. Eragon, of course, manages to parry the blows, but he’s stunned by the “dwarves’ speed and ferocity”. One of his guards goes in for the attack, but before Eragon can grab the guy and yank him back to safety, one of the assassin’s knives gets a hit in on the guard’s neck. Eragon is shocked to see that the guard is Kvistor - the one I called Dead Man Walking - and even more shocked to see that Kvistor’s throat is “glowing molten red” and it’s disintegrating around the dagger. Instead of turning into a gibbering mass of absolute fear and terror and shock that his guard died, Eragon thinks this:

I can’t let them so much as scratch me, Eragon thought.

Pretty coherent thought for being in a tense situation. Considering he’s never seen anything like this before, and has just seen his guards die in a horrific manner, Eragon should be freaking out, or at least panicking despite exuding a calm exterior. Instead, he has a coherent thought devoid of any emotion, so it’s like he doesn’t even care, that he’s not worried, or scared.

We’re told that Eragon becomes “enraged” at Kvistor’s death, rather than being shown, and he retaliates pretty quickly by killing Kvistor’s murderer. It seems he stabs the dwarf so fast that the dwarf doesn’t have time to evade the blow, so he drops dead at Eragon’s feet. Then this happens:

With all his strength, Eragon shouted, “Stay behind me!”

Thin cracks split the floors and walls, and flakes of stone fell from the ceiling as his voice reverberated through the corridor. The attacking dwarves faltered at the unbridled power of his voice, then resumed their offensive.

So what, is he the Dragonborn now? Did he just accidentally fus roh dah the hallway? Eragon has never had such power before, and it feels like Paolini pulled this straight from Skyrim. The only difference is that the Dragonborn can use their voice to blow things away, if I remember correctly. Eragon’s just causes a little bit of structural damage and nothing else. Unless it’s theatrics, I don’t remember one instance of real life where shooting could cause structural damage on a sound building. Reverberating through a corridor, sure, but not causing cracks in stone floors and walls.

Eragon backs up so he can have room to maneuver around the corpses and settles in a low crouch, weaving his falchion back and forth, “like a snake preparing to strike”. I’m no expert with weapons, but this seems kind of silly to do. Maybe not, considering they’re in very close quarters without much room to maneuver, but it just seems silly. Anyway, we’re told that Eragon’s heart is “racing at twice its normal rate” and he’s “already gasping for breath”. Then the urgency of the scene is broken by the next paragraph by describing the hallway as being eight feed wide, which translates over into the ability of three of his six remaining assassins attacking him at one time. Two attempt to surround him while the third charges straight at him, trying to cut him with that evil sword of his.

Afraid to duel with the dwarves as he would have if they wielded normal blades, Eragon drove his legs against the floor and jumped up and forward. He spun halfway around and struck the ceiling feet first. He pushed off, spun halfway around again, and landed on his hands and feet a yard behind the three dwarves. Even as they whirled toward him, he stepped forward and beheaded the lot of them with a single backhand blow.

This is very anime, isn’t it? He performs all these stunts that he’s never really had training in, unless he did it off screen, and he’s performing them with the same skill and grace as a master martial artist. I’m not really sure why he has to perform all these tricks - other than the Rule of Cool - just to jump over the dwarves’ heads. Even more ridiculous, I feel, is that Eragon lands on his hands and feet, and immediately is able to pop up as they’re turning around to face him all so he can behead them on a backhand swing. All three get beheaded at the same time, in one swing. Which is, I feel, physically impossible. Eragon’s sword would have to be sharper than a professional chef’s meat knife. And that’s not even taking into consideration the fact he has to aim and swing at opponents shorter than he is, nor the fact they’re in motion, nor the fact their bones are far denser than human bones. If anything, their neck vertebrae should’ve stopped the falchion from cutting through one neck completely. Maybe not the first, but definitely the second or third, as the momentum of the swing would’ve been reduced significantly. Now, I’m not a combat expert or weapons expert, but I would think that an ordinary blade - however enchanted - wouldn’t be able to cut through three necks at once.

So down go three of the assassins. Eragon jumps over the bodies to return to his original position, and he does it just in time because he feels a flick of wind against his neck as a dagger skips by his neck. Another dagger cuts at his pants, managing to tear them open. Eragon flinches and starts swinging blindly so he can win himself some room. He’s also shocked in the fact that his wards didn’t work and they should have. Quickly after this thought, Eragon slips in a pool of blood and goes down. He knocks his head and gives himself another concussion. At this point, his three remaining guards - who’ve probably been standing by smoking cigarettes while they waited for their cue - leap over him and start swinging their weapons to save Eragon from being murdered. Eragon recovers pretty much immediately after that, jumps to his feet while berating himself for not thinking of using one of his Insta-Death-spells earlier. So he uses one, and surprise surprise, nothing happens. The assassins are protected by “numerous wards”. A whole paragraph ensues where Eragon tells us that if he had the time he could figure out how to counter or outright defeat the wards, but that would take a long time, and the flow of this particular battle won’t allow for such a thing. He certainly seems to have plenty of time to go through this entire thought process... He then decides that he’s going to use a “mind-spike” to try and overwhelm the assassins’ minds. Unsurprisingly, that doesn’t work either. The dwarves’ minds are unbreakable.

Eragon’s conclusion is that someone else is protecting them, and that there are more involved in this than just those in front of him. How he comes to this conclusion in particular in this moment in time and not “Oh my god, why can’t I break into their minds, I’ve never encountered this before!” I don’t know. If I were in the same situation, I probably wouldn’t be able to form a coherent thought because I’d be too busy trying to figure out a way to survive.

Anyway, Eragon goes into the physical offensive and manages to wound one of the assassins. His guards kill the assassin. Eragon turns his attention to the next assassin, who raises his shield to stop any blow Eragon might make. Eragon decides to use his full strength to attack the shield directly - instead of, you know, going low or feinting or anything more reasonable - because he wants to “shear [the shield] and the arm underneath in half”. Why, no idea. Seems completely stupid in the interest of this fight. Especially because, as we’re told, Eragon seems to have forgotten about the dwarf’s elf-like speed, so when the falchion comes roaring in, the dwarf tilts his shield to drive Eragon’s blow to the side. Sparks erupt as the shield and falchion connect, and Eragon’s momentum carries the sword all the way past the shield and into the nearby wall, whereupon the falchion shatters. Eragon drops the sword, grabs his assassin’s buckler, and starts wrestling with the dwarf for it. Eragon seems to be having a terrible time, because the dwarf actually seems to be overpowering him. So Eragon releases the shield with one hand, balls up a fist, and punches the shield as hard as he can. His fist goes through the steel of the shield and we’re told he feels no pain on account of the calluses on his knuckles. The force of this punch sends the assassin into the opposite wall, where he presumably breaks his neck upon impact, considering it’s described as him slumping to the ground “like a puppet whose strings had been severed”.

Eragon gets his hand back and draws his hunting knife. The last assassin attacks and gives Eragon a hard time. Eragon is forced into retreating. At some point, his heel hits a corpse and he trips. He goes down and is in prime position to be killed. So the dwarf unleashes an evil laugh (literally) and stabs downward at Eragon’s chest. Which means he’s standing over Eragon, who’s fetched up against a wall, and has nowhere to really move. Eragon still tries to evade by rolling further down the hallway, but he knows he’s dead. And so the Deus ex Machina fairy comes to his rescue.

As he completed a revolution and his face was momentarily turned toward the dwarf again, Eragon glimpsed the pale dagger descending toward his flesh, like a bolt of lightning from on high. Then, to his astonishment, the tip of the dagger caught on one of the flameless lanterns mounted on the wall. Eragon whirled away before he could see more, but an instant later, a burning hot hand seemed to strike him from behind, throwing him a good twenty feet through the hall, until he fetched up against the edge of an open archway, instantly accumulating a new collection of scrapes and bruises. A booming report deafened him. Feeling as if someone were driving splinters into his eardrums, Eragon clapped his hands over his ears and curled into a ball, howling.

Hero’s about to die, because you’ve written them into a corner. What do you do? Why, you pull out a deus ex machina! That’s exactly what this is. Instead of Eragon being rescued by his remaining guards, or having him manage to evade enough to get some distance, the attacker’s magic sword randomly hits a flameless lantern, which shouldn’t be anywhere near the dagger’s trajectory. The dwarf is stabbing downward toward Eragon’s chest, which is currently below the attacking dwarf. Therefore, the dagger is moving in a downward arc, such that it wouldn’t hit anything but its target, unless that lantern bravely sacrificed itself to save Eragon by throwing itself off the wall and into the path of the blade. It would make more sense if Eragon uses magic to make the lantern explode, or if he kicked the dwarf back from him and then the dagger hit the lantern, or if Eragon managed to yank the lantern out of its holder and threw it at the dwarf, who then swiped at it with the dagger and broke it. But not this. This doesn’t make sense at all, especially if the hallway is tall enough for Eragon to stand comfortably and maneuver the way he does earlier in the attack. If that’s the case, then there shouldn’t be any way that the dwarf’s dagger hit that lantern. I could give the benefit of the doubt if the lantern was closer to the ground, but even in actual human-sized hallways, floating lights like these lanterns are usually put high enough you need a ladder to reach. So this is pure deus ex machina, because Paolini can’t bear to have anything bad happen to his precious self-insert. Or anyone else for that matter.

When the dust settles, Eragon suddenly feels all his aches and pains. He’s confused and groggy, and he’s staring out at the site of the explosion. We’re told that the major boom blackened a ten-foot span of the hallway. Ash is still falling like rain, and it’s hot. The dwarf who’d been about to kill Eragon is covered in likely fourth-degree burns and is also likely suffocating because his airways were burned to crispy bits. He eventually expires. Eragon’s three remaining guards are at the edge of the blast radius, where they’d been thrown by the force of the explosion. Aside from blood dripping from their ears and mouths, they’re perfectly okay. The only other damage they have is their beards are now unkempt and the links of their hauberks are glowing red, but they’re safe from the heat because of the leather under-armor they’re wearing. Eragon starts to move forward but he’s stopped by a sudden severe pain from between his shoulder blades. He tries to feel for the wound, but the pain’s too much, so he stops. He looks at the burned dwarf and realizes that he must have similar wounds on his back.

No shit, Sherlock. You’re lucky you’re not dead, considering you were at the very center of the blast.

So Eragon heals himself and heads over to his guards, where he asks them if they’re okay. Well, nobody can hear him because they’ve all had their eardrums exploded by the concussion. The same goes for Eragon too, because he can’t hear his own voice. So again he heals himself and his guards so they can hear again. Then Eragon asks them if they’re hurt. One dwarf answers and says that they’re basically fine, and is Eragon okay. He responds that he’s fine, too. Then he goes into the explosion area and kneels by Kvistor’s body, hoping that he can still save the poor kid from death. Dude, we all knew he was dead the moment you described his throat as DISINTEGRATING. I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m fairly certain no one can survive a disintegrating throat. Eragon only realizes this when he gazes on Kvistor’s throat again. All Eragon does is bow his head and then asks why the lantern exploded. He’s told that the lanterns are simply filled with “heat and light” and if they’re broken, all that energy escapes at once and then boom. Eragon then asks what clan these assassins might be from. He’s told that the assassins don’t carry any marks upon them that Eragon would recognize, but they’re carrying a bracelet made of braided horsehair and amethyst. Eragon wonders what significance the bracelets are. So his guard answers:

“This amethyst,” said the dwarf, and tapped one of the cabochons with a soot-streaked fingernail, “this particular variety of amethyst, it grows in only four parts of the Beor Mountains, and three of them belong to Az Sweldn rak Anhûin.”

Because we can’t have any suspense or lead up to the big reveal. We have to be told that it’s definitely the clan that hates him on principle of being a Dragon Rider, because of course it can’t be anyone else. We can even throw suspicion on another clan or group even as a red herring. This ruins all the mystery that this scene could hold. We’re led along by our noses, not even given a chance to speculate or feel like there’s something deeper going on, because there’s been no evidence so far that the Anhuin clan has demanded Eragon’s life. They’ve just been jerks to him. So there’s a massive disconnect between the events here and what happened before.

Eragon wonders if Vermund ordered the attack, to which he’s told that nobody can say for sure. For all they know, the bracelet is a red herring to lay blame on Vermund, given the history of the clan. But, you know, since we can’t actually have anyone else as the bad guy, yeah, it’s definitely the Anhuin clan.

“Blast them,” Eragon murmured. “Whoever it was, blast them.” He clenched his fists to stop them from shaking. With the side of his boot, he nudged one of the prismatic daggers the assassins had wielded. “The spells on these weapons and on the . . . on the men”—he motioned with his chin—“men, dwarves, be as it may, they must have required an incredible amount of energy, and I cannot even imagine how complex their wording was. Casting them would have been hard and dangerous. . . .” Eragon looked at each of his guards in turn and said, “As you are my witnesses, I swear I shall not let this attack, nor Kvîstor’s death, go unpunished. Whichever clan or clans sent these dung-faced killers, when I learn their names, they will wish they had never thought to strike at me and, by striking at me, strike at Dûrgrimst Ingeitum. This I swear to you, as a Dragon Rider and as a fellow member of Dûrgrimst Ingeitum, and if any ask you of it, repeat my promise to them as I have given it to you.”

You know, he’s been told the name the dwarves use - knurlan - multiple times in conversation, so I don’t know why Eragon doesn’t use it here when he’s identifying the attackers. He calls them men, hesitates, calls them men again and then clarifies their race when he could just as really use the dwarf word “knurlan”. Also, the insult he uses - “dung-faced” - bothers me, because it’s stupid and childish for this situation. Eragon has no tension here, and he should. He was nearly killed, after all, and would be dead of not for a stroke of luck. He should still be feeling some anxiety. And I find his speech hilarious because Eragon doesn’t do shit. He literally sits with his thumbs up his butt while Orik does the hard work. Even when this does come to pass, Eragon does nothing but sit pretty while Orik does all the talking. I think the only bit of strenuous work Eragon does is let some dwarf lawyers examine his memories of the incident to prove he isn’t lying. I feel like this little speech would have more impact if Eragon actually did something to be involved with the future proceedings, rather than just be a prop to them.

The dwarves bow before Eragon, and then one says that they’ll obey him, and that he does Hrothgar’s memory honor. Another dwarf says that whatever clan is responsible, they’ve violated the law of hospitality by attacking a guest. He says they’re lower than rats. Then he spits on the floor and so do the other dwarves. Eragon heads over to where his falchion is and fiddles with the pieces, while he tells us that he must’ve hit the shield and wall so hard that he overwhelmed the spells he’d put on the sword. And then he whines that he needs a proper Rider’s sword.