Eragon pt. thirty

chapters Hall of the Mountain King, Ayra's Test Or as a friend of mine calls it the elf's tale of woe

Summary

So, Eragon is standing around and a dwarf comes to tell him that the king wants to see him. Saphira wants Eragon to take the rock of doom with him. Why? Because it's a rider's sword and he should forge a new history for it. Earlier she disliked the sword because it belonged to someone who killed dragons and their riders. She gives no reason for this change. She does say that Eragon needs to show that he's above people's disapproval (Ajihad suggested that he not wear it because of its history) and his own person. But there's nothing that happens to her to make her think any differently of the sword. No conversation between her and Eragon or anyone else. She just changes her mind all of a sudden.

Eragon meets up with dwarf who takes them to see the king. The throne room is below the city. What is the point of the throne room being below the city? Shouldn't it be apart of the city? There seems to be a lot of things that aren't apart of the city that are important to running a city. Why aren't these parts apart of the city? I guess it's more dramatic. Anyway, I'd like to call your attention to this lovely bit of description as Eragon and Saphira approach the king.

"Their footsteps echoed through the hall as they advanced toward the throne. In the recesses between the stalagmites and stalactites rested large statues. Each sculpture depicted a dwarf king crowned and sitting on a throne; their sightless eyes gazed sternly into the distance, their lined faces set in fierce expressions. A name was chiseled in runes beneath each set of feet." (440)

Now, this book is from Eragon's perspective. How did he know that the dwarves there were kings? Orik didn't say anything to this effect. No one told Eragon about it for sure. They could be, for all he knows, dwarf gods. Or mythic heroes. They could have been... anything. But somehow Eragon knows that they're kings.

Then we get the description of the king.

"The dwarf king himself sat like a statue upon a raised throne craved from a single piece of black marble. It was blocky, unadorned, and cut with unyielding precision. Strength emanated from the throne, strengtt that harked back to ancient times when dwarves had ruled in Alagesia without opposition from elves or humans. A gold helm lined with rubies and diamonds rested on Hrothgar's head in place of a crown. His visage was grim, weathered and hewn of many years' experience. Beneath a craggy brow glinted deep-set eyes, flinty and piercing. Over his powerful chest rippled a shirt of mail. His white beard was tucked under his belt, and in his lap he held a mighty war hammer with the symbol of Orik's clan embossed on his head." (441)

Enough stone metaphors used there for you? Dwarfy enough for you? King dwarf then says some tried things and apparently also likes Eragon. These dwarves who don't trust riders really seem to like Eragon.

King dwarf, while talking to Eragon says, "The first statue is the likeness of my ancestor Korgan who forged this mace, Volund."

A war hammer is not a mace.

This is a war hammer:

This is a mace:

See, one is a hammer. The other one has spikey bits on it. They are different. They are not comparable weapons except for the fact that they are both do bludgeoning damage. Other than that they are completely different.

Apparently the dwarves have ruled from under Farthen Dur (where the city is located)since the dawn of their race. If they've been living underground all this time, why did they build a city above ground? Do they live both above and below ground? I'm not certain about this and it bothers me. It's as if Paolini is keeping with the dwarf stereotypes by making them live underground but at the same time making them different by making them build above ground in mountain cities. It dichotomizes their society. People usually have a reason for building under or above ground. They usually don't waste their effort in building both ways.

They talk for a bit about Eragon's motivations and then we learn that Dwarf is Dwarf King's nephew. He then dismisses Eragon. Saphira goes off to the dragon hold and Eragon eats breakfast and then goes to the Library. For some reason, the dwarves, though they've been around since before the humans were around, have the same alphabet as the humans do.

While reading he is ambushed by the twins and they have hot sex together in the library.

Well no. But they do ask him to join their little magic club and apologize to him for their earlier behavior. Paolini further indicates that the Twins are evil by comparing them to the Ra'zac. They insult each other without really insulting each other. Apparently the Twins only want to know what Brom taught Eragon. When he calls them out on this, they start to be threatening and leave.

Eragon finds Dwarf polishing his war ax. Why? Because he's a dwarf and that's what dwarves do in their spare time. He couldn't be reading. Nope, he's polishing his ax. Because he's a dwarf.

Apparently a lot of people take the stairs up to the dragon hold because after Eragon wanders off to find Angela (who he doesn't find) he discovers that someone is there. It's a girl. The Star Sapphire casts a rosy glow on her.

Now, I was originally going to protest this as how do blue gems cast rosy glows, but I did some research and apparently not all sapphires are blue. So... he gets away with this. Barely. Mostly because he never gives the Sapphire a color.

The woman is called Nasuada. As Paolini naming conventions follow, she's important. In fact her father is Ajihad. She's also met with Murtagh. She came all the way up to tell Eragon a message from her father. Now we learn that there is a pulley system in place that allows transport of goods to the upper levels. Why don't people use it? We don't know. She then leaves after giving him her message.

The next day Eragon goes to the training field. He meets up with Fredric who is not important because he has a normal name and is told that he's going to be tested on endurance because he may be in a battle that last for hours or even weeks if it's a siege. Now they're not going to be fighting continuously in a siege. That's the point of a siege. You stand around and try to starve the people you're sieging out. There's really very little fighting. And battles don't really last that long because people will get tired out and retreat for a rest. But this isn't important because the Twins show up and test Eragon in his magic skills.

They test him and test him and test him. Finally they tell him to summon the essence of silver. Eragon has no idea what that means. But before he can try Elf Sue shows up and berates them for apparently summoning silver is something that only a master can do. We also get another long description of Elf Sue including what she's wearing.

When she walks into the center of the training field everyone stops and stares at her in awe of her presence. He actually says that.

Eragon and her then fight. It's very sexual. We get things like "Taut skin only a hair's breadth away." and "Their sinuous forms wove together like twisting ropes of windblown smoke". There's really nothing you can say to that. Really.

She eventually beats him.

Saphira calls him out on his crush and is Jealous.

We then get the Elf Sue's Tale of Woe©.

Durza apparently tried for months with torture to get her to reveal information. "His methods were ... harsh. When torture failed, he ordered his soldiers to use me as the would. Fortunately, I still had the strength to nudge their minds and make them incapable." (462) She was able to stop people from raping her, but not in making them let her go? I guess she really liked the torture. And apparently, as previously seen, it didn't seem that very harsh. Her pretty face was still intact.

Then we learn that Eragon and Elf Sue have a Speshul connection. Eragon tells her about his dreams of her and she tells him that she could feel a presence sometimes and that she's never heard of someone being able to scry in their sleep. Technically speak, according to Paolini, he shouldn't have been able to see her at all. But he could because they're just that special.

Brom had a ring (which Eragon now has) that makes him a very special elf friend and Elf Sue has a tattoo on her shoulder that's the same as the mark on the ring. Which she doesn't want anyone to know about. This is probably important. We'll hear about this more later.

Eragon finally goes and checks up on Murtagh. Murtagh has a very nice room. He's being very well treated. He's got a nice bed and all the food he wants. They bring him up books from the library if he wants and Ajihad's daughter who's name I can't recall, comes and visits. He really likes her and Eragon is actually jealous. "Eragon listened to his praise with growing apprehension. It may be nothing,he reminded himself, You're leaping to conclusions. Yet the foreboding wouldn't leave him." They're so cute when they're slashy.

The chapter ends with Murtagh saying that he's content living in his room for now.

As a side note, I just recalled something. In the very beginning of the Novel we are told that the Spine is a very dangerous place. People don't enter it lightly. But then later Brom and Eragon cross it like twice and there's no mention of it being dangerous at all. There's no mention of that at all. It's just like every other mountain range. So... why is the mountain range so dangerous in the first place, if they can cross it without worry. This seems to be another instance of Paolini writing one thing and completely forgetting about it a few chapters later.

This is the second to last one, there are three more chapters left. So far nothing has happened. Events have happened but there has been no overall story. No building of character. No drive. No story arc. Things have just happened one after another in a fairly random manner propelling Eragon around the world. He goes here, he goes there, but there hasn't been any tension. I haven't ever felt in fear of Eragon's life. Or anyone else's. Everything is just very there. Eragon hasn't changed a single bit since he started on this journey except to grow more powerful physically. But emotionally, he's still the same empty brat that we met in the beginning. He has not grown as a character. He just is.

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For Jeremy:

There is apparently an Evil Dead musical.

That is all.

Baby Pandas!

( Baby pandas! )

Eragon pt. thrity one

Chapters The Shadows Lengthen, Battle under Farthen Dur, the Mourning Sage

Summary

Last leg people! Here we go!

Eragon gets woken up from his sleep by a dwarf. Something urgent is happening. Ajihad needs to see him right away! Going down there's apparently something very serious happening. Urgals are attacking. There's an army of them about a day's march away in the tunnels and are going to attack the city from under ground.

Wait... We're three chapters away from the end of the book and he's randomly dropping in an army of Urgals? An army of Urgals that has not been seen or mentioned or even hinted at? They're just showing up out of no where?

Just... because... apparently... we need a climatic battle sequence to finish the book ...maybe? Because there isn't really a reason to have a random army of Urgals running around? So... and...and.. *dies from the stupidity finally*

*A pretty man in his mid twenties wanders in. He has black hair and brown eyes. His ears are pointed and he's wearing a sword, some jeans and a tunic with combat boots. He nudges the body for a moment before turning to face the readers.*

Hi. I'm Alec, Kippur's muse. Apparently she's dead, so I'll be taking over until she revives.

Right, so random army of Urgals show up. How are they getting there? Apparently the dwarves for some reason have a lot of abandoned tunnels. Tunnels that they built and then were uninhabited from the day they were mine. Which, of course, is not reasonable. You do not spend your time and energy digging through rock and then not use it. Unless you are a completely and utterly idiotic people. Like these dwarves appear to be. Apparently only weird dwarves go there.

And apparently the invading army is also led by a bunch of idiots because instead of laying siege to the dwarf city, they're actively going to attack it. Through the tunnels. They have a city that's completely reliant on outside food sources and they're attacking it. Through the tunnels. You do not attack people through tunnels. The invading army is always at at disadvantage because they're in tight quarters and they need to get their people through while the defenders only need a few people to stop them from coming through. It's elementary battle tactics.

Apparently the Varden have missed a bunch of Urgal armies going to this one abandoned city. Ajihad says, "I suspect that Orthiad is now being called Ithro Zhada. That's where the Urgal column that was chasing Eragon and Saphira was supposed to go, and I'm sure it's where the Urgals have been migrating all year." (468)

Now. We have a bunch of evil creatures. They're migrating near your secret hide out. And you don't follow them to where they're going? You just sort of watch them as they pass by and wave? Are you trying to get yourself killed? Really? I mean... just... you know what? You guys don't deserve to win. I'm sorry. I'm revoking your life pass because you're just too stupid to go on.

They don't even know how many Urgals there are! Have they not been paying attention to these Urgal columns that have been marching by? Or do they just go, "Oh look, some Urgals. Oh what's that? Something shiny! WHOO!"

So, they decide on a course of action. Now, what I would do is to plant traps in all the tunnels and force the invaders back out of them to where they came from thus not letting them near where we are located. I would then block off the tunnels. I would have already had food enough for a siege. I wouldn't have built a city that can be cut off from it's food supply so readily. But anyway, then I would take a contingent of soldiers to where ever they are and attack their food supplies and essentially put them under siege. Do, maybe some guerrilla attacks. There have to be passes in the mountains that we can use.

What do they do?

"Our only hope is to contain the Urgals in three of the larger tunnels and channel them into Farthen Dur [that's the valley where the Dwarf City is located] so they don't swarm inside Tronjheim like locusts." (469)

So... they're going let the enemy forces, the enemy forces with the superior numbers, into their enclosed valley to fight them, giving them the narrow pass/tunnels to defend. Exactly what I would do. Except not.

Apparently the reason why the don't shut all the tunnels down is that the Urgals may go into a place that they don't want them to or attack other dwarf cities. This is what we call poor planning. See, if you have tunnels you should have a way to close them off in case of attack. Thus preventing people you don't want to get in. Dwarves are supposed to be master craftsmen, I'm quite certain they're capable of coming up with some really, really, sturdy doors. Also, the city of Tronjheim is built upon a dense network of tunnels so if they collapse some of them, the city on top may collapse too.

I think the city planers must have been on some very special mushrooms when they came up with this plan.

Now, it was previously mentioned that in times of attack the city could hold the entire population of the dwarves, so one would assume that it's got some good defenses. Apparently it is not because they have to evacuate the civilian population to surrounding valleys.

Where there may be Urgals.

Yes.

So, Eragon, all tingly with the fear of upcoming battle goes to collapse some tunnels. The collapse some tunnels. Eragon apparently is so powerful now that collapsing tunnels doesn't seem to tire him out.

The dwarves, who do not like dragons, then present Eragon and Saphira with some dwarf made dragon armor that was just sitting around and apparently fits. Aren't they lucky?

My wife, Verra, is a dragon. She doesn't need to wear armor to stop arrows. Her scales are as hard as diamonds. Which stops arrows quite well and saves on the hassle of having to put on armor and having it get ruined or rusted or out grown. While the dragon armor may look neat, I think Verra's much better off.

They also conveniently have armor for Eragon to wear. "A stiff shirt of leather-backed mail that fell to his knees like a skirt. It rested heavily on his shoulders and clinked when he moved. He belted Zar'roc over it which helped keep the mail from swinging. On his head went a leather cap, then a mail coif and finally a gold-and-silver helm. Bracers were strapped to his forarms and greaves to his lower legs. For his hands there were mail-backed gloves. Last, Orik handed him a broad shield emblazoned with an oak tree" (474)

Now, as a comparison I also have some armor that I wear. It's a leather and mail jerkin and some bracers. I do not wear anything heavier than that because I was not trained in wearing anything heavier than that. It took me months to learn how to fight wearing that armor. Armor is heavy, even the armor I have. It restricts movement. It's something I couldn't fight in well when I first put it on because I wasn't used to it. I don't use a shield. I have a shield, but I don't use it. Why? Because I don't know how to use it. If I were to take the shield into battle with me I would end up hurting myself more than hurting the other guy. The style of sword fighting that I was trained in requires that I keep my off hand free, or with a smaller weapon. I can't use a shield.

But Eragon, apparently, is special enough that putting on the armor is enough to teach him how to move in it. And apparently it doesn't hinder his movement in any way or make him tired from wearing it. He wears it like it's a new jacket, as opposed to a lot of heavy metal.

So, they prepare for battle. Murtagh is allowed out of his cage, I mean room, to fight to prove his good intentions. Elf Sue is also fighting because apparently she has a debt of honor or something. Eragon tells her to stay safe, for his happiness. Isn't teenage love cute?

They sit around all night, waiting. And then they take a nap. In the armor.

Elf Sue wakes him up. Apparently she's an archer, but she's around the melee people. Why is there an archer with the melee people? She'll have more of a chance to hit a friend than a foe while within the melee ranks. This is why Archers have their own position with in the battle ranks. So they don't hit their own side. And in melee, I don't care what Leggy did, a bow is a liability not an asset.

Eragon also has a bow. I think it's a long bow. Not important. What is important is that he's shooting within the melee ranks towards the oncoming Urgals while the archers, in the archer's ranks are shooting. There is a reason why you have a different place for the archers than the melee fighters. So that the archers don't hit their own side.

The Urgals prove that they have all the intelligence of moldy cheese by leaving the safety of the tunnels to fight against the people out in the open. They even charge.

Then they fight. Lots of Urgals fall to Zar'roc's thirsty bite. Saphira, stupidly, stays on the ground instead of attacking from the sky. If this was Verra, she's be flaming too, making strafing runs. It's much harder to hit a moving, flying target that breathes fire! But apparently Saphira sucks at being a dragon because she doesn't breathe fire. Saphira, because of this, becomes encircled by a bunch of spear wielding Urgals letting Eragon go into a blood frenzy to free her.

Finally she and Eragon actually FLY. Took them long enough. They fight. Eragon helps King Dwarf. King dwarf is wearing golden armor, thus making him a target and an idiot because gold sucks as armor. Very pretty, but sucks as armor. Saphira lands to fight, again, showing all the brains of a tapeworm, no offense to the tapeworm. Dwarf king is described as using his hammer to sound the gong of death for each enemy he smote. Yes, gong of death. I'm thinking like that gong show, where they rang the gong when you sucked. I'm sorry, you suck, die now.

Blah more fighting. Angela the witch is there as well as Serious Ass, both fight. There's a ridiculous number of Orcs.. Urgals.

The battle is going badly, they're out numbered. They fighting continues for hours. No one appears to die during the battle. At least no good guys. Why aren't they dead from exhaustion yet?

Then apparently people are trying to get inside the dwarf city from the tunnels below. Saphira's armor takes a large blow making it hard for her to breath, but she manages to get them up to the dragonhold in time for Eragon to slide all the way down to the bottom. This is the only reason why the slide was put into the story, so that Eragon could slide all the way down in a dramatic manner. By himself.

He has no back up, and he goes to fight an unknown number of Urgals, by himself.

Apparently he's suicidal.

The Urgals show up and so does Durza.

Durza and Eragon fight, both physically and mentally. Durza trying to get into Eragon's brain. Mind. Thing which he does not have. Despite having been fighting for several hours, Eragon has enough energy to give Durza a decent fight. Despite this, Eragon manages to get into Durza's head. And we get the lifetime channel's version of Durza's life. Yes, really. Apparently Durza was not a bad person. He was just possessed by one. I really don't care. This isn't the time to be giving me this information.

If you're at all interested, Durza is another Tragic Stu. His parents were horribly murdered. He even weeps at their graves wishing he has been taken too. He nearly dies in the desert. He's rescue by a sorcerer. The Sorcerer trains him and calls him, "Desert Rat" isn't that cute? Then more people come by and kill off his mentor. He summon spirits for vengeance and instead got possessed. Tragic no? Yes? Don't really care? Want him to die now?

Durza, while all this is getting dumped into Eragon's empty little head, hits Eragon on the back with his sword cutting through his armor and skin. He nearly drops unconscious but is saved by Saphira breaking through the gem and finally using fire Elf Sue on her back using magic. This distracts Durza long enough for Eragon to hit him through the heart.

Do you have any idea how difficult it is to hit someone directly in the heart under normal battle circumstances? This is what the ribcage is for. To protect your heart from getting stabbed. You are not going to be managing such a shot under the circumstances Eragon was in. Unless of course you are Eragon and have to make the hit so that way you can be one of the three people who killed a Shade and lived.

Eragon then proceeds to have a case of the vapors and faints.

*looks at Kippur's body.* Ah, it looks like she's back for the final chapter! Well, it was nice doing this. *wanders off*

*Kippur staggers up and takes a deep breath.* Final chapter people! Hang in there.

Eragon, having mind melded with Durza the Shade isn't sure who he is any more. I'm certain this is from somewhere, I just can't place where. He eventually sorts himself out and reflects on what has happened to him. Then Eragon is contacted by Yoda. Yes. Yoda. The person who contacts him (Named Osthato Chetowa, the Mourning Sage; Togirga Ikonoka, the Cripple Who is Whole, but will be called Yoda for convinence sake) basically tells him to go with Elf Sue to the Elf lands so that Yoda can train him.

Yoda tells him that what he has done was a great deed and modestly Eragon thinks, "The stranger was right; what he had accomplished was worthy of honor, of recognition. No matter what his trials might be in the future, he was no longer just a pawn in the game of power. He had transcended that and was something else, something more. He had become what Ajihad wanted; an authority independent of any king or leader" (494) Beyond the fact that just killing something doesn't negate your pawnage in the game of chess, Eragon's ego just inflated to about the size of ... the dwarf city. Which makes him even more unlikeable because who wants to read about a guy who goes around saying how great they are?

Eragon wakes up, there's a happy reunion. Apparently killing Durza was the key to defeating the Urgals because when he died they started to fight each other. In the middle of battle. They start fighting each other, instead of the people trying to kill them. These creatures are not evil. They're ... very strong word indicating lack of intelligence to the nth degree.

There's some talk about the Twins not answering Eragon, Murtagh says they were fighting off Urgals and were busy, Eragon of course doesn't believe this.

And then we learn that Eragon has a scar just like Murtagh. Apparently this scar makes him disfigured. His back is no longer baby smooth, so apparently he's horribly disfigured. It's not like the scar is ruining his good looks. It's on his back. Which is perfectly easy to hide. He's not disfigured. But apparently to his Stuish self this means disfigurement.

Hi, me again. I would just like to point out that I have a scar. On my face. And I don't consider myself disfigured. If anything it just enhances my looks.

The book ends with Eragon vowing to go see Yoda.

And thus ends our journey with Eragon.

I will end with a haiku.

Eragon has many pages
Nothing interesting happens within it
The book, finally is over.

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Book recommendations! I need good book recommendations!