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antishurtugal_reborn2023-12-18 02:45 pm
Murtagh Spork: Part One, Chapter Three
Well, it’s been about four months on the run by now and we’ve reached a valley with a river running through it. I’ve never been here before but the river seems familiar. It took me a while to realise why – it’s part of the same watercourse which flows past my house, and therefore part of the river I was trying to source when I found Chinook’s egg. But we’ve had to lie low again in a handy overhang which we’ve protected with an invisibility spell, so until our pursuers give up and leave I might as well get on with the spork. Or would that be fork? Sigh. Who the hell thought it was a clever idea to rehash a scene we’ve read before? The different POV doesn’t add shit and we don’t learn anything new. Plus… Mister Stabby.
But we swore we’d return, and now we have, and this fucking book is going to pay.
So Morontagh has just realised the obvious bad guy he decided to meet up with in a public place with a small child right in the middle of it is, in fact, a bad guy. His reaction to this is classic Paotagonist psychopathy.
The loaded spring in Murtagh’s chest felt fit to burst. At that moment, he ceased to think of Sarros as a person. Rather, the man became a thing, a problem to be solved, quickly and without hesitation.
No concern for the stupid kid he just got into a completely unnecessary hostage situation whatsoever. Nope, it’s Killing Time.
He takes a moment to berate himself for being a moron:
Stupid, Murtagh thought. He should have realized that spreading around so much gold might cause a problem. It wasn’t a mistake he would make again.
Now watch as he proceeds to make about a million other really stupid mistakes, pausing periodically to think “well that was dumb” without learning anything or becoming less idiotic and careless.
Bad Guy continues to threaten the kid, and we get what passes for Morontagh being worried about her:
The girl kept her eyes fixed on Murtagh. He could feel her desperate fear, and he knew she was waiting—hoping—for him to help her. She seemed so terribly young, so terribly vulnerable, and an overpowering affinity welled up within him.
Resolve girded him.
He smiled faintly. Had he really expected to visit Ceunon without getting wound up in some form of trouble? Oh well. So it was.
Christ, where do I even start? The disgusting objectification of the kid, I think. The way she’s described here is dehumanising, full stop. Morontagh’s feelings toward her and her situation are detached to the point of careless. He’s smiling, for fuck’s sake. A little kid is in extremely serious danger, you ass! Why are you acting like this?
He throws a spell at Bad Guy, without trying to break into his mind first. Uh, isn’t it the rules of magic in this setting that you have to defeat the other guy in a mental duel first or you’ll get yourself killed? Not that it isn’t really stupid but this breaks continuity and canon.
So does what comes next, as the spell doesn’t work thanks to FUCKING WARDS, and Morontagh has no idea what’s going on. That is until Bad Guy… explains it for him for absolutely no reason. Not only does he instantly whip out the randomly introduced bird skull necklace he’s wearing, but he also tells Morontagh exactly where he got it from and what it does and who charmed it.
Why are you telling him this? You had the advantage and you just gave it away!
Morontagh gets all oh it is so on now and uses the Word except that doesn’t work either. Yeah, Paolini handed him the biggest Deus Ex Machina ever which as it was first introduced should basically render all hostile magic null and void, but now he suddenly flips and renders it essentially useless for the entire book. Why are these bird skulls able to resist the spell which literally controls all magic? Just ’cuz. It won’t ever be explained, beyond this brief passage.
The only way to defy the Name of Names was with wordless magic—magic cast without the guiding safety of the ancient language.
Since fuckin’ when?!
This is supposed to be an action scene, by the way, but so far it’s been 95% Morontagh just standing there thinking big dramatic thoughts about the situation instead of actually doing anything.
At this point the kid’s dad comes charging in like an idiot and gets knocked out. Bad Guy taunts Morontagh some more, whereupon – groan – he surreptitiously picks up his fork and casts a spell on it before attacking the bad guys. Never mind negotiating for the kid’s safety or anything silly like that; it’s time for the first of many, many examples of Paolini making his protagonist act like a complete idiot just so we can have a big dramatic fight scene with kickass choreography and one-liners just like a movie!
And choreography is the word, because the ensuing fight is a bunch of movie style nonsense complete with the characters pausing to shout “dramatic” shit like “Slice him crosswise! Kill him! Cut open his belly and spill his guts.”
And I see the issue of missing exclamation marks has made a triumphant return, too. As has the ongoing issue with the POV character having far too much time to think in the middle of what’s supposed to be a fast-paced scene.
The complete lack of concern for the stupid kid likewise persists, with Morontagh at one point straight-up dumping her on the floor and ignoring her while she crawls to safety. He doesn’t even put himself in the way in case they go after her again, or shout at her to run for it. She might as well be nothing but an object.
Anyway, so despite wielding a tiny fork Morontagh is somehow able to… oh, just see for yourselves.
The men had the advantage of reach with their swords, but Murtagh sidestepped their blades and slipped into striking range. Faster than the eye could see, he stabbed with the fork: one, two, three, four hard impacts that dropped the men to the floor, where they lay silent or groaning.
Yeah, this is Roran sidestepping multiple spears and kicking a guy in the belly all over again, and just as utterly divorced from reality. And Morontagh goes just as psychotic for good measure.
His blood ran hot, and a slick of sweat coated his forehead, and crimson crept in around the edges of his vision. But his breathing remained measured. He was still in control, even as the thrill of violent triumph coursed through him.
RIP, Murtagh’s original personality. We barely knew ye. It’s depressing just how little time it took for Paolini to destroy him.
One of the baddies attacks the kid’s mother for no reason, so Morontagh throws the fork at him from behind and impales him through the back of the head, again in a moment right out of a stupid action movie.
Morontagh finishes off the remaining goon and then takes down their leader, who in typical Movie/Crap Fantasy Novel Bad Guy fashion blathers on for several paragraphs before snuffing it. As in the original short story he calls Morontagh “moon-addled and nose-blind” and I still have no idea what the fuck that’s supposed to mean.
Morontagh loots his corpse and finally pays attention to the stupid kid and her parents. He gives them his money and then presents the stupid kid with the even stupider magic fork. The Mister Stabby unpleasantness plays out again and nobody is amused, and then Morontagh officially crosses the line.
He was about to leave when, on a sudden impulse, he reached out and put a hand on the girl’s arm. He spoke the words of a healing spell, and the girl stiffened as the magic took effect, reshaping the scarred tissue on her arm.
Cold crept into Murtagh’s limbs, the spell extracting its price in energy, drawing off the strength of his body to make the change he willed.
“Leave her be!” said Sigling, and pulled Essie away, but the spell had already done its work, and Murtagh swept past them, cloak winged out behind him.
As he moved through the kitchen at the back of the inn, he heard Sigling and his wife utter sounds of astonishment, and then they and Essie started crying, but with joy, not grief.
Murtagh wasn’t done. While Essie’s parents were so distracted, he reached out with his mind and slipped unnoticed into their stream of thoughts. He was subtle, and no probing was needed. The very thing he sought was forefront in each consciousness: the moment, three years ago, when Essie had bumped into her father in the kitchen while he was carrying the dented iron stewpot with the crooked handle that had been full of water boiled for washing. Essie had been running about, not looking, not paying attention, and she had been where she wasn’t expected. From Sigling now, guilt and relief intermixed. From his wife, relief and sorrow and a relaxation of close-held resentment over how her husband had caused, though unintentionally, the accident.
Murtagh withdrew. His fears had been unfounded, and for that, he was glad. Essie and her siblings were safe with their family. There was nothing more he needed to do here.
What the actual fuck.
This is rape, straight-up. Or the magical equivalent of it. He just modified the kid’s body without her consent, and nor did he even explain what he was going to do! He grabbed her and cast a spell on her without a word of warning and completely ignored it when the parents rightfully freaked out, and then just walked off without a word. And as if that wasn’t bad enough, then he mind-raped them for good measure! What the fuck ever happened to “a man’s mind is his last sanctuary and you must never violate it”? And wouldn’t Murtagh of all people, the guy who refused to have his mind examined in book one, know that and be extremely sensitive about the mere idea of violating someone’s mind?
But nope, he just pats himself on the back like he’s the hero of a Western who sure cleaned up this town, boy howdy.
Oh, and Scars R Bad, as usual.
He felt tears in his own eyes. At least he’d been able to accomplish some good today. No child should have to grow up with a scar like Essie’s…or his own. For an instant, he imagined smoothing his back with magic as he’d smoothed Essie’s arm, but he shook off the thought. Some hurts went too deep to heal.
You high-handed hypocritical piece of SHIT.
I just can’t even right now. This entire section is absolutely disgusting. Is Morontagh suddenly in a contest to see how fast he can become just as horrible as his half brother? Because he’s winning.
Cut to him outside for a rehash of the ending of the short story, complete with whining about having gotten blood on him. Thorn is worried about him but is quickly brushed off, and Morontagh thinks about maybe he should “return to old friends”.
...who would those be, exactly?
Anyway, so the chapter ends where WormFork cut off and I guess now the real adventure begins. Ahahahah.
One other thing worth noting here is that, once again, we have a Rider/dragon relationship in which the dragon is basically just the Rider’s fancy sports car which he parks outside while he goes off and does stuff. Thorn doesn’t get to do anything in this book. Chinook and I are on the run too, but we’ve stayed together. If Chinook can’t go there, then neither will I. After all she’s in this situation because of me. And she’s my friend. Paolini’s Riders aren’t friends with their dragon “partners”, and that really shits both of us off. But now the danger has passed and it’s time for us to get going. Spork on, gang. Spork on.
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