Where the Heart of Anti-Shurtugal Rises Again.

Chapter Two - A Fork in the Road

This chapter opens with the narrator telling us it’s “two days past” some holiday we’ve never heard of before called Maddentide. It’s also starting to snow despite there being stars in the sky and no mention of clouds. We’re also in the city of Ceunon. We’re then introduced to our main character for this chapter, a girl named Essie. She’s currently having a temper tantrum as she heads down an alley. We’re supposed to think she’s upset to the point of tears, because the next line says her mouth is set in a “hard line” and her cheeks are “burning” and she struggles not to cry. Except the line before it says she’s “stomp[ing] down the cobblestone alley”, and I’ve never seen or experienced anyone who stomps when they’re struggling not to cry unless they’re having a temper tantrum and didn’t get their way. Anyway, Essie claims that she hates “stupid, mean Hjordis”, claims Hjordis has a “fake smile” and pretty bows and “nasty little insults”. She absolutely hates this girl that we will never meet nor see throughout this section, yet we’re also supposed to hate Hjordis simply because Essie does. 

Well, guess what. I don’t. I hate Essie.

Essie then talks about someone named Carth. She says she can’t stop thinking about his “reaction”. She says Carth had looked “so betrayed” when Essie had pushed him into the trough. Carth didn’t even say anything to her, but just sat there where he’d fallen and stared at her. Essie then promptly complains that her dress sleeve is still wet from the muddy water that splashed over her. Yeah, you read that right. She goes from being sorry for Carth, who supposedly is her friend, to whining that her sleeve is still wet. Anyway, that’s all we hear about this for a while. Essie suddenly tells us she can hear the sound of waves slapping against the wharves, which means she’s getting close to the docks. She says she keeps to the alleys because adults rarely use them as they’re so narrow, and I have to wonder, why is Essie purposefully avoiding adults right now? Isn’t she the victim in all this?

I say with as much sarcasm as I can.

Anyway, she keeps describing the scenery and how there’s a random rook perched on the eaves of a place called the Sorting House and how said rook cries out, and then we get this:

Essie shivered, though not from the cold, and pulled her shawl closer around her shoulders. A dog had howled during the night, the candle on the little shelf where they left offerings of milk and bread for the Svartlings had gone out, and now a lone rook had called. Bad omens all. Was there more ill fortune coming her way? She didn’t think she could bear anything worse.... 

The only reason I know how old Essie is right now is because I skimmed through this earlier, and because of Morontagh’s book, but she doesn’t sound like a little kid. She sounds like she’s an older child, almost a teenager. She doesn’t sound like she’s as young as she’s supposed to be. What little kid talks about bad omens? What little kid recognizes those? I could understand if she mentioned that her parents had said something about bad luck, and she’s just repeating what they said, but not her making the conscious effort of talking about the stuff. Little kids don’t talk like that. Insofar, Essie sounds much older than she really is, and that’s jarring. Besides that, if Essie is supposed to be a little girl, she wouldn’t be just walking through town after going through something so embarrassing as what happened to her. She would running full tilt home so she could cry into her mother’s skirt about how life isn’t fair. And even if she didn’t go to cry into her mother’s skirt, she still would be all but bolting home so she could cry into her pillow. Right now, she just sounds like she’s far older than she really is, acting quite mature despite what just happened to her. And I’m not saying little kids can’t be mature for their age, and there’s evidence that Essie ought to be mature for her age, but the way this reads is like… she’s just old. Not a little kid. 

Essie continues to stomp home, which turns out to be a tavern/inn called the Fulsome Feast. She describes the windows as being made of crystal, specially made by dwarves and I have questions about that, because when were these windows made? Dwarves haven’t been seen in Alagagaglag for over a hundred years, but Essie doesn’t mention anything about the inn being in her family for generations and the windows are old, old, old and the pride of her family. Dwarves have only just begun to rejoin the general population, so to speak in the grand scheme, and crystal windows are expensive. The land just got done a war and it’s been a YEAR at that. How could anyone recover so quickly as to be able to afford crystal windows? Not only that, but you’ll notice that there is NEVER ONE MENTION about the war, even though this place - Ceunon - is the very city the elves attacked in Book Three. This is where Queen Izzy slaughtered a bunch of humans as “examples”.

But we don’t hear about any of that, even though all of these characters were there when that war was happening.

Anyway, Essie says she feels pride every time she sees these windows, even now, when she’s in the midst of her temper tantrum. She claims no other building on the street has anything as pretty as these crystal windows. Do you have whiplash yet? Because I do. She started the story being upset about some girl named Hjordis and pushing some boy named Carth into a trough and that her sleeve is still wet, but we’ve gone three paragraphs since those things were mentioned and not once has Essie bothered to think about them. Continuing on, Essie suddenly apparates into the common room and says it’s “as loud and busy as ever”. Essie pointedly ignores the guests and heads to the bar where her father is. She says he’s busy pouring beer, washing out mugs, and serving food. He spares her a glance when she ducks under the half door at the end of the bar and says:

“You’re late,” he said.

“Sorry, Papa.” Essie got a plate and loaded it with a heel of bread, a wedge of hard Sartos cheese, and a half-dried apple—all taken from the shelf under the bar. She was still too small to help with the serving, but she would help with the cleaning up later. 

This is what I don’t like about this - Essie is “too small” still to help serve, but she’s supposed to be anywhere between eight and ten, judging by Morontagh’s age-guesstimate, which means she should be working in her family’s business. Essie is not “too small” to be helping her family run the business. She may not be able to serve, but she can wash dishes, clear tables, sweep, help peel potatoes and cut vegetables, she can stir soup, fetch firewood, and if there’s an inn portion to this tavern - which there is, because Essie describes the tavern as an “inn” earlier -, helping her mother change bed linens and do the wash. There’s plenty to be doing, especially for her, but this feels like Eragon all over again - a poor tavern keeper’s daughter who acts like a nobleman’s daughter, just how Eragon was a poor farmer’s nephew but acted as entitled as a nobleman’s son. The fact that she’s so privileged as to go to a noble’s party is rather strange, but it could be chalked up to the fact her parents managed to work it out so she could go, but her father doesn’t act like she had his permission to go. She just went. He just says “You’re late”, like she went shopping and stayed out a little too long. He doesn’t ask her how the party was, or why she looks like she’s about to cry, or anything related to what’s going on, and he had to know where she was. Also, Essie goes right for stuffing her face instead of getting to work, which she should have done. She’s coming back from a party for fuck’s sake! And instead of trying to escape to her room, being ordered back down and into the kitchen to help her mother, or anything like that, Essie grabs food and says “I’m too little to do any real work” - which, historically, isn’t right, because she should be helping her family do little things, as peasant children as young as five were expected to help out. Essie isn’t a nobleman’s daughter. She’s a tavern keeper’ daughter. She’s working class. This doesn’t make sense, unless Nasuada instituted child labor laws, which I highly doubt - and more or less ignores her father. And her father is hardly the loving, caring man that we’re supposed to realize he is. He just… is there. A prop. I didn’t like this scene in Murtagh, and I really don’t like it here.

Essie then proclaims that later, when everyone’s gone to bed, she’s going to sneak out to the cellar and steal all the supplies she needs. Which also sounds suspiciously like Eragon. Anyway, she leaves that thought for the moment and carries her plate to an empty chair in front of a great stone fireplace. Next to this chair is a small table and on the other side of said table is another chair, which is currently occupied. Said occupant is a man described as “lean and dark-eyed, with a neat beard and a long black travel cloak bunched around him”. He has his plate balanced on his knee, and he’s eating a serving of roasted turnips and mutton and using a fork to do so. An iron fork, to be specific. Essie ultimately decides she doesn’t give a shit and the guy is just like any other traveler. A lot of them come to her family’s tavern, apparently. Then she does this:

She plopped down in the free chair and tore off part of the heel of bread, imagining that it was Hjordis’s head she was tearing off....She continued to rip at the food with her fingers and teeth, and she chewed with a ferocity that was oddly satisfying. 

And now the sociopath comes out. Seriously, this is extremely disturbing. Essie has done a complete 180 from her earlier mood, which was that she was about to cry, and now she’s suddenly not about to cry and she’s instead imagining murdering the girl that she knew was a bully. It’s also interesting to see that this child doesn’t seem to give a shit that there’s a stranger at the table she wants to sit at. She’s going to sit there anyway, dammit, and he can just like it! That is incredibly rude. This not how she would have been taught. If anything, she would have been taught to eat at an empty table or she would have to eat in the kitchen where no patron can see her. To me, this doesn’t make any sense, not with the time period this is being written in, unless the writing is being done with modern century ideals. That’s the only explanation I have for this behavior. Other than the sociopathic tendencies of this child. It really makes me wonder if Essie isn’t going to start torturing and murdering small animals.

She still felt as if she was about to cry, which just made her more angry. Crying was for little children. Crying was for weaklings who got pushed around and told what to do. That wasn’t her! 

Except how she is. Essie is very much all of this, and no amount is denying it is going to change it. She knows this Hjordis girl is a bitch. She’s always been a bitch, if I can infer that much. Hjordis has power and loves lording that power over other people, especially Essie, because she seems to know Essie will follow her orders, no matter Essie’s own feelings on the matter. I’m not sure if it’s because Essie wants to be accepted by Hjordis and really be friends with her, or if Essie is just trying to protect her family business, or if Essie is just a snotty little bitch herself who, despite knowing Hjordis isn’t a nice person, does what she says because she can use Hjordis as a scapegoat to do what evil act she wants to do. Like… Essie also shows some sociopathic tendencies already, so what if she wants to act on the urge to hurt people, but she refrains because she won’t be able to get away with it? But then Hjordis tells Essie to push her supposed friend, so Essie does so because she’s always wanted to push her friend, she just didn’t have an excuse to do so? Essie is just making excuses for herself. She doesn’t act like a little kid who’s been bullied. And I can’t tell if the reason she’s acting this way is because Paolini himself was never bullied as a child - even by his own sister - or because he thinks this is how kids act when they’re bullied. Essie should be bawling her eyes out to her mother. Her father should have asked her what happened, instead of telling her she’s late, because that implies that Essie didn’t leave Hjordis’s party right after she was embarrassed, but instead lingered around and waited for a while. It also gives the impression that her father doesn’t care about her, which we know isn’t true.

Also? Crying isn’t for weaklings, you asshole. Crying is a normal, healthy function that mentally healthy and self-secure people do when they’re feeling a certain way. This just screams of that “boys don’t cry” mentality, and yes, I know Essie is a girl, but she’s being written by a man who obviously doesn’t understand the minds of little girls. Now, to caveat this, if Essie was the teenage girl she sounds like instead of the eight to ten year old we know she is, I’d understand her being angry about wanting to cry. But also if Essie was a teenager, then she wouldn’t have been suckered by Hjordis. Of course, I could be projecting that, but it just feels like Essie is the kind of girl who wouldn’t put up with Hjordis’s crap, no matter what social standing she has. Hjordis is the stereotypical bully because she has power. Technically, so does Essie, if she thought about it. But because this is supposed to be “tragedy” and we’re supposed to go “poor Essie, she’s so abused, Hjordis is such a rotten little bitch!” it just sounds like Essie is whining that her life isn’t fair because of the choices she made.

Essie starts making noises of frustration - you know the kind people make when they want someone to ask them what’s wrong without actually telling the person they want them to ask what’s wrong - and bites into her apple. She promptly gets the stem stuck between her front teeth, which makes me wonder why she’s biting into the top of the apple as opposed to the side. Well, her little tactic works and the strange man says she seems upset. Essie reacts like this:

Essie scowled. She plucked the stem from between her teeth and flung it into the fireplace. “It’s all Hjordis’s fault!” Papa didn’t like her talking to the guests too much, but she had never minded him. The visitors always had interesting stories, and many of them would ruffle her hair and comment on how adorable she was and give her candied nuts or syrup twists (in the winter, at least). 

You know, I’m starting to prefer the “rewritten” version of this in Murtagh, where we only see this through Morontagh’s eyes, because Essie is a selfish little twat. She knows her father doesn’t like her talking to the patrons, far be it from me to know why, and I’m guessing it’s because he doesn’t want her to bother his paying guests with her inane questions or her horrible bratty attitude, and she disobeys him for no fucking reason other than she wants to. Essie is a little brat who does what she wants, and this is exactly why I’m thinking she’s using Hjordis as a convenient scapegoat to cover her “mistake” in pushing her friend. She wanted to push her friend, and Hjordis gave her the opportunity to do it. It’s also pretty creepy that these patrons look at an eight to ten year old as “adorable” and give her presents apropos of nothing. That just screams Sue, and it screams even louder than Eragon screamed “Sue” when he was introduced. It’s really like Essie is a modern girl who isn’t required to do more than exist, when she really should be working right now. As far as I can tell, the only people who are here working are her and her parents, and right now, Essie is fucking around instead of working, which means just her parents are working. And if this tavern is a decent size and it gets decent business, which I assume it does considering, in the paragraph that introduced her father, it stated that he was “pouring beer, washing out mugs, and serving dishes of smoked herring”. This indicates to me that he’s extremely busy and could use some help, but he doesn’t have any. Because he doesn’t have any employees and his daughter is apparently too good to get her hands dirty. She just wants to annoy patrons and stuff her face. She doesn’t want to work, even though she would have been made to once she was old enough. I already don’t like Essie after her acting all sociopathic, but I really don’t like her now that she’s acting like an entitled little brat who thinks the world revolves around her. I already had that in spades with Eragon and it was frustratingly annoying then. I wanted to reach through the pages and smack him. Essie has upgraded - I want to reach through the pages and strangle the ungrateful little brat.

This apparently catches the man’s interest because he puts down his fork and turns to face her better. Then he asks who Hjordis is. Essie says she’s the daughter of the chief mason. The man wonders if this makes Hjordis important. Essie shakes her head and says it makes her think she’s important. Honestly? It does make her important, at least, more important than a tavern keeper’s daughter. Anyway, the man - who I’m just gonna call Morontagh from now on, because we all know who he is - asks what Hjordis did to make Essie upset. Essie spits “everything!” in answer and takes a “savage bite” out of her apple because she is now back into temper tantrum mode. And I take savage glee when she bites the inside of her mouth because I know how much that hurts. However, Essie doesn’t react like most people who bite the inside of their cheek, only swallowing her apple and ignoring the pain. Morontagh takes a drink “from the mug by his hand” as opposed to the water skin he keeps on his belt, and randomly says this is interesting. He dabs at his mustache to clear off some beer foam and then asks if Essie feels like talking about it. Maybe talking about it will make her feel better.

Essie looked at him, slightly suspicious. He had an open face, but there was an intensity to his dark eyes, and a slight hardness too, that she wasn’t sure about. “Papa wouldn’t want me to bother you.” 

It’s a tad too late for that, you little twat! You literally sat at the same table he was sitting at, the one table out of who knows how many that were occupied or not, and you basically baited him into talking to you by acting all pouty! You manipulated this total stranger into talking with you by purposefully sitting at the same table and being all upset! You did this ON PURPOSE. This wasn’t a situation where Essie sat at a different table and cried into her apple by herself, and Murtagh then got up from his table to go sit with her to try and comfort an upset child! Essie WENT TO MURTAGH’S TABLE AFTER SAYING HOW SHE KNEW HER FATHER DOESN’T WANT HER BOTHERING HIS PATRONS AND SHE DIDN’T FUCKING CARE. Essie wants the attention. Just based on this paragraph and everything she’s done so far, Essie is a straight up manipulator. She is a sociopath. She purposefully sat at a stranger’s table and straight up threw a temper tantrum until he spoke to her, she baited the hook with a sob story, and now that the man is showing interest in her plight, she’s saying the old line of “but I don’t want to bother you”, is classic manipulation. She wants to tell her story. She wants someone else to look at her as the victim of the situation and tell her it wasn’t her fault that she was a snotty little bitch, so she can feel better about herself for having pushed someone who was supposedly her friend into a water trough at the behest of a girl she KNOWS IS A BULLY. These girls have interacted in one way or another for their entire lives - remember, they’re only about eight to ten years old, maybe twelve, if we’re being generous - which is a long time in the grand scheme, and certainly long enough for someone to realize it’s not healthy for these girls to interact, no matter what social standing they may have. If Essie truly is a girl who regrets hurting her friend, this kind of behavior from Hjordis would have made Essie stop trying to be friends with Hjordis a long time ago. As we find out, Hjordis has bullied Essie most of their lives, but Essie keeps going back for more. All that’s missing is the gimp suit. Have I mentioned I hate Essie? Because I hate Essie.

Morontagh says he’s got time because he’s waiting for someone to show up. He says if she wants to talk about it, he’s all ears, but he says this in super fancy speak that is incredibly out of place in a city like this, or at least in the current area, which is the docks and a working-class establishment. Anyway, Essie reacts like this:

He used a lot of big words, and his accent wasn’t one Essie was familiar with. It seemed overly careful, as if he were sculpting the air with his tongue. Despite that, and despite the hardness of his eyes, she decided he seemed like a nice person. 

Okay, what the fuck? What freaking young child looks at a full grown adult’s way of talking as “sculpting the air with his tongue?” That is just… fucking creepy. No child in the history of ever has ever thought about an adult talking like that. I could understand if Essie just stared at him because she didn’t understand the words he used, or asked about the words he used, because small children constantly ask questions, and “why”, but Essie doesn’t do that. Which is another indication that she isn’t a child. She’s a young woman. An uneducated young woman, but still a young woman. Except she’s not. She is a child. The author can’t write children to save his life! None of this makes any fucking sense and it’s driving me up a wall. It also doesn’t make any sense to me that Murtagh would use such big words with what’s obviously supposed to be a small child, because he always struck me as the kind of person who talks at the level of whoever he’s dealing with at the time. And not in a snooty, looking down his nose sort of way, but in like a… trying to build rapport and be equals kind of way. It also bothers me that Murtagh’s mode of speech changed, because he didn’t talk like this in the quartet. It’s almost like Murtagh is trying to show off how educated he is by using these big words on a small child who’s likely never had any schooling. It’s an attempt to impress her, I think. Which is also fucking creepy if you think too much about it. 

Essie then pulls the “I can’t tell you anything unless we’re friends” manipulation card, which is different from the “my papa told me not to talk to strangers” manipulation card, and Morontagh bites and asks how they become friends. Essie says he has to tell her his name, of course! She even calls him “silly”. I’m... going to refill my cup with Dr. Pepper. I have a feeling I’m going to need some comfort in the pages ahead. ...Anyway, Morontagh reacts like this:

The man smiled. He had pretty teeth. “Of course. How foolish of me. In that case, my name is Tornac.” And he held out his hand. His fingers were long and pale, but strong- looking. His nails were trimmed square. 

Because these are all things A TEN YEAR OLD notices about a man. Paolini, if you’re trying to make me feel squicky, you’ve succeeded. If this was not your intention, YOU’VE STILL MADE ME FEEL SQUICKY. This is a very prepubescent young female noticing things about an ADULT MALE that not even an adult woman would actually notice. Pretty teeth? Who notices teeth right off the bat unless those teeth are like… extremely tar-covered from excessive smoking or they’re obviously missing. Usually most people notice the clothes, or the eyes, the face as a whole, weight, skin color, not teeth. That sounds like Essie is two seconds away from telling Murtagh “it puts the lotion on its skin or it gets the hose again”. She also randomly notices his fingers and his fingernails. I know someone might notice how long his fingers are, but his nails? Unless they’re like hooked claws or blinged out and five inches long, I hardly even notice nails. But Essie is picking up all these details that a little girl should not be picking up unless Murtagh is making obvious effort to get her to notice. Which he isn’t, I know, but even if he was, that’s still all sorts of creepy. This is not okay. None of this is okay. 

“Essie Siglingsdaughter.” She could feel a row of calluses on his palm as they shook hands. 

And now we touch upon a pet peeve of mine. All throughout the previous four books, Paolini had daughters with their last names following their mother and sons following their father. So, for example “Eragon Bromsson” or “Katrina Ismirasdaughter”. However, here, Essie’s last name is her father’s name, not her mother’s. Now, on one hand, it could be a Ceunon-only thing, where the child traditionally takes the patronym, kind of like how children in today’s world take their father’s last name as part of their government name. On the other hand, we’ve had matronyms and patronyms shoved down our throats since they became a thing in Book Two. For it to suddenly change now, where Essie is taking her father’s name, it doesn’t make much sense. Moreover, her last name would be something closer to what her profession was, like Tavernkeeper, rather than her father’s name. Of course, the author has a bad habit of changing things from book to book, page to page, paragraph to paragraph, so this might be a thing that falls under said bad habit. Or, on the other other hand, Paolini didn’t bother thinking up a name for Essie’s mother, so he just threw her father’s name there because it was all he had.

Morontagh says it’s very nice to meet Essie, then asks for the umpteenth time what’s lodged itself in her rectum. Essie chooses to stare at the apple now instead of Morontagh’s face, then plops the apple back on her plate and once again says that everything is Hjordis’s fault. Yeah, you said that, Morontagh replies. Essie explains that Hjordis is always being mean to her and makes her friends tease her. Morontagh - alias Tornac, but screw that noise - suddenly gets all serious and says “that’s not good at all”. Essie reacts like this:

Encouraged, Essie shook her head, allowing her outrage to shine forth. “No! I mean... sometimes they tease me anyway, but, um, Hjordis—when she’s there, it gets really bad.” 

I have to ask something. Ceunon is a big city, right? Ceunon isn’t some podunk village, right? So how is it that Essie and Hjordis even know each other? They’re not in the same social circle from what I can understand. Hjordis is the daughter of Ceunon’s earl’s chief mason, which means that, though both she and Essie are in the same tax bracket (for lack of better words) Hjordis lives up near the keep and likely rubs elbows with noble children, while Essie lives in a tavern near the docks. Essie does not rub elbows with noble children. She runs elbows with fishermen's’ children and other working class children. So how did Essie and Hjordis even meet? Out of all the peasant girls in this huge city, Hjordis and her friends specifically sought out Essie and chose to harass her. By rights, they never should have met, unless Hjordis’s father really likes the Fulsome Feast, which is Essie’s family’s tavern. We can infer that maybe he does, considering the leverage Hjordis held over Essie was that she was going to tell her father never to go to the Fulsome Feast. Which, honestly, doesn’t make sense. Beyond that, there are likely a dozen other taverns Hjordis’s father could patronize, and each one could cater to a more high (or less) brow society than what even her father’s rank in society is. Also, why do they have the same circle of friends? Or is it that Hjordis’s friends just torment Essie just because? None of this makes sense to me. The only way it does make sense is if Essie is a massive Sue, and guess what. She is. All of this is happening to Essie because she is a Sue. Otherwise, Hjordis has no reason to associate with Essie or anyone she thinks is below her, and there are young girls far closer geographically to Hjordis to treat this way than Essie. If the tavern was close to the castle like Hjordis’s house, then I could understand them having this tete-a-tete, but it’s not. So this is just happening for the sake of forced Dramah and to eat up innocent trees.

Morontagh asks if Essie was a victim of said teasing today, and she says yeah, sorta. She takes a moment to snack on some cheese while she thinks about what happened “over the past few weeks”. Morontagh just sits there and waits. Essie says she really likes that about him and that he reminds her of a cat. And how many cats do you know, Essie? I have six, and trust me, patient is the last thing that they are. They like to sit around and watch you or sleep a lot, but when they’re ready for whatever they want, they certainly do not like to be made to wait. Anyway, Essie finally starts to talk again, saying that Hjordis starting being nicer to her “before harvest”, so she thought things might be getting better. Hjordis even invites Essie to her house. Essie glances at Morontagh and tells him Hjordis’s house is “right by the castle”. Impressive, says Morontagh. Essie is so happy Morontagh understands, and then goes on to say that Hjordis gave her a yellow ribbon that never appears in this story, and invites Essie to Hjordis’s Maddentied party. Morontagh asks:

“And did you?”

Another bob of her head. “It—it was today.” Hot tears filled her eyes, and she blinked furiously, disappointed with herself. 

Wait, hold up. The Maddentide party was today? Didn’t this section start with the words “two days past Maddentide”? Hold on. YES IT DOES. TWO DAYS PAST MADDENTIDE. So why the hell is Hjordis having a Maddentide party TWO DAYS after the thing has passed? Now, I understand that in the modern world, certain holidays can and do start weeks before the actual holiday and will continue for weeks past the actual holiday because humans are weird like that. But why would that happen here? This is an agricultural medieval setting where everything is dictated by the weather and seasons. Having a party to celebrate something that’s already past, especially for someone of Hjordis’s standing, would be an extreme fashion faux pas. And again, this is sounding like they’re teenage girls and not little girls, which they are. This party wouldn’t be Hjordis’s party - it would be her father’s (or mother’s) party, which wouldn’t be happening because that would be a hit to their social standing. Worse, this is suggesting the world revolves around Hjordis and her schedule, but she’s the DAUGHTER OF THE CHIEF MASON, not the daughter of Ceunon’s earl where she could possibly get away with something like this. Her father is the beck and call of the earl, so he can’t be having parties willy nilly after the celebration is over because he has to work. And considering this takes place A YEAR after Eragon’s departure, there’s plenty of rebuilding for a chief mason to oversee. He couldn’t afford to have a party when the earl might be counting on him to get homes rebuilt or other buildings fixed or just plain built in the first place. It doesn’t make any sense.

Also, there’s the crocodile tears. The thing about this is, I get that she’s upset, but she’s upset for the wrong reason. She’s angry with herself because she’s crying. She’s not angry with herself for following the lead of a bully and hurting and embarrassing someone who’s been her friend since they were three. She doesn’t care about that. She doesn’t care that she hurt her friend, that she embarrassed him, that she ran off and left him behind. She’s only mad that she’s crying. She’s only disappointed that she’s crying. Her actions she could care less about, but her being a “baby” is like the world is falling apart.

Morontagh hands Essie a handkerchief so she can wipe her face. Essie hesitates at first because the cloth is so clean, but eventually she snatches it out of his hands and wipes her eyes. She at least has the decency to thank Morontagh for that, calling him “mister” despite the fact she knows his false name. He smiles and says it’s been a long time since someone called him “mister”, and I’m trying to figure out when he was called that, and my best guess is someone called him that during the gap between the ending of the Green Brick and this story. Anyway, Morontagh says she’s welcome and he supposes that the party didn’t go as well as hoped.

Essie scowled and pushed the kerchief back toward him. She wasn’t going to cry anymore. Not her. “The party was fine. It was Hjordis. She got mean again, after, and... and”—Essie took a deep breath, as if to fill her stomach with courage—“and she said that if I didn’t do what she wanted, she would tell her father not to use our inn during the solstice celebration.” She peered at Tornac, wondering if he knew why that was so important. “All the masons come here to drink and”—she hiccupped, despite herself —“they drink a lot, and it means they spend stacks and stacks of coppers.” 

First off, yes, the word “hiccuped” is spelled with two ‘p’s and not one, which my spell check picked up as wrong. It only wants one ‘p’. However, after some Google Fu and checking with the Oxford dictionary, it’s not spelled wrong at all. However, the two ‘p’ spelling is not common use, and as I stated before, it made my spell check have a tantrum. So pass on that one, I just thought I’d mention it because Paolini has a penchant for using British spellings for certain words and then in the same paragraph or page using the American spelling for that same word. Anyway, on to the meat of the subject. It still bothers me that these two girls travel in the same social circle when, clearly, they live in opposite parts of town, but I guess that can all be handwaved away with this explanation of Essie’s. She states that “all” the masons come to her father’s tavern to drink and spend money, and by “all” she literally means all, so Hjordis’s father frequents the place. Which is probably how the two came to know each, but I can’t see Hjordis’s dad bringing his daughter to a drinking establishment unless both fathers thought their daughters would like to be friends with each other. By the way, how the two girls even got involved with one another in the first place is never explained, if I haven’t made that clear by now. This explanation also shows that Essie is supposed to be portrayed as a girl who loves her father and wants to protect him, even if it means doing bad things, and this is relatable because children do acts like this if it means protecting someone. Or getting something from someone through manipulation. We’re supposed to be taking Essie’s word as gospel, believing everything that comes out of her mouth. Hjordis invites her to this party with the ultimate intention of bullying her into making a fool out of herself. Sure, Essie could have firmly believed that Hjordis’s word was as good as gold and her father really would put a boycott on the tavern, but it also doesn’t make sense if you just stop and think about it. These two girls are aged between eight and ten years old - give or take - and a little girl isn’t about to tell her father what to do and how to do it unless she’s a spoiled brat in a Veruca Salt sort of way. From everything I can glean based on Essie’s description of her, Hjordis isn’t a spoiled brat - she’s just an obnoxious bullying bitch who knows Essie will fold and do her bidding if she finds the right threat. Essie doesn’t have to do anything Hjordis tells her to, and yet from what I understand, Essie gives in to the bullying and embarrasses the shit out of herself on a regular basis every time the two interact.

I mean, think about it. These girls have to have known each other for a while. Essie even talks about how Hjordis was becoming nicer the closer it got to the party before ultimately inviting her. She talks about how Hjordis’s friends are sort of not really nice to her unless the queen bee is around. She doesn’t talk about avoiding Hjordis or telling her to sod off. We could say that it’s because of the social difference in their positions - daughter of a mason versus the daughter of a tavern keeper - but there’s not really that much difference between the two. Hjordis is not nobleborn. She is a peasant. An upper-middle class peasant to be sure, but still a peasant. And again, Ceunon is a city. Even if the masons boycotted the tavern, it wouldn’t go under! You’ve still got literally everyone else in the city to come and spend money. Essie is just a sociopath looking for her next mark, and she found it in Murtagh currently. She’s spinning her sob story so he’ll pity and empathize with her, but doesn’t she really care so long as she gets what she wants. I know what Paolini was going for, but I really think his sheltered life ruined his ability to write a convincing bullied character. He doesn’t have the experience of being bullied as mercilessly as Essie seems to be - and no, I’m not counting him possibly being bullied by his own sister as experience, because the bullying that happens between siblings is far different than the bullying that happens between peers - so Essie comes across more as a sociopathic monster than an aggrieved little girl who just wants someone to listen to her sad story and tell her it wasn’t her fault.

Morontagh puts his plate on the table and leans toward Essie. We get some description about his cloak we don’t care about, and then he asks Essie what Hjordis wanted her to do.

Ashamed, Essie stared at her muddy shoes. “She wanted me to push Carth into a horse trough,” she said, tripping over the words in her rush to get them out. 

If Carth is around the same age as Essie, then he’s about an average 8-10 year old’s height, which places him about 50.4 inches (128 cm) to 54.5 inches (138.5 cm). A small horse trough is 5’ x 2’ x 2’, a medium is 6’ x 2’ x 3’, and a large is 7’ x 3’ x 2.5’. So, Carth is roughly about four feet tall, give or take depending on nutrition and other factors. Essie is supposed to push a four foot tall boy into a water trough that’s anywhere between 2-3 feet wide, and anywhere between 2-3 feet deep. Essie could have seriously hurt Carth. Depending on what the trough was made from, and how he fell into it, Carth could have some serious knee injuries, head trauma, and there is every possibility that he could have snapped his neck. She could have seriously injured him by giving in to Hjordis’s demand. Also, Essie calls Carth her friend, but apparently he’s not worth very much to her if she’s going to just do what the bully wants without any argument. Essie doesn’t once say that she argued with Hjordis about it - she only says that she “had no choice”. Maybe in a little kid’s mind, this is true, but considering the time period this is set in, and the fact it’s only been A YEAR since the war ended, a heaping dose of RESPONSIBILITY AND SAFETY would have been drilled into these kids’ heads about not doing anything dangerous. Essie would have been taught, and given, a lot of responsibility by now, so she would have had the maturity to tell Hjordis to go fuck herself. Or I think so, anyway. Of course, we’re only getting Essie’s side of the story, and we get no input from the other players in the game. But, based on how this chapter started, with Essie throwing what amounted to a tantrum on her way home, I’m extremely inclined to say that Essie has always wanted to hurt a human but just never had the excuse to do so. Hjordis gave her that excuse, and she took full advantage of it.

Morontagh asks if Carth is Essie’s friend. She nods in response and tells the audience she and Carth have known each other since they were three years old. So, some friend Essie is, right? Choosing to push her friend of five to seven years into a horse trough based on the threat of a girl she hasn’t known for as long. Anyway, Essie tells Morontagh that Carth lives on the docks and his father is a fisherman. Morontagh points out that Carth wouldn’t get an invite to Hjordis’s party. Essie replies:

“No, but Hjordis sent her handmaid to bring him to the house and...” Essie stared at Tornac, her expression fierce. “I didn’t have no choice! If I hadn’t pushed him, then she would have told her father not to come to the Fulsome Feast.” 

To be fair, Essie shouldn’t have been invited to this party either. Like I’ve said before, the two girls aren’t even in the same social sphere and wouldn’t have interacted unless Hjordis’s father brought her to the Fulsome Feast specifically so she and Essie might become friends. And I honestly don’t see that happening because Hjordis’s father would be there to drink, not to make playdates between his daughter and daughter of the tavern’s proprietor. Hjordis is acting like she’s a nobleman’s daughter, but she’s not. At best, upper-middle class, which affords some power, but not as much as Essie seems to be claiming. Her father is just a chief mason for the earl of Ceunon. He is not the earl. He’s just some guy who works for said earl, and probably makes a better living than some, but he’s not a lord or anything like that. Also by this paragraph, this suggests that Hjordis (or at least her handmaid) knows where Carth lives and it also suggests that Hjordis expects peasants to heed her summons. Hjordis IS NOT A NOBLEBORN GIRL. SHE HAS NO POWER OVER ANYONE. She can’t make Carth go anywhere with her handmaid if he doesn’t want to, so why did Carth go? It doesn’t make any sense! He would have to know how Hjordis is, because he’s friends with Essie and would have gotten an earful from her about what a bitch Hjordis is. So why would he WILLINGLY go to her house? He would have to know it would just end badly for him. Ceunon isn’t so small that everyone knows everyone like in Carvahall and that people who don’t travel in the same social circles would step out of said social circles to torment people. Especially since THE WAR JUST ENDED A YEAR AGO. These kids should be terrified to step outside their houses, or if not that, then certainly not willing to go just anywhere with strangers. This whole sequence feels more like the neighborhood bully picking on the local kids because they can. Hjordis doesn’t even live in the same area as Essie and Carth. So why would she bother to associate with them? Even suggesting something like “they’re there and easy to pick on” doesn’t even make sense, because there has to be a dozen or more victims closer to Hjordis’s home. She wouldn’t have to venture from her house next to the castle to the Fulsome Feast which is next to what wharves to find someone to bully. She could pick any kid in her neighborhood to torment like this. 

Morontagh says he understands. He states that Essie pushed her friend, and then he asks if she apologized to him. To which, Essie replies:

“No,” Essie said, feeling even worse. “I—I ran. But everyone saw. He won’t want to be friends with me anymore. No one will. Hjordis just meant to trick me, and I hate her.” Essie grabbed the apple and took another quick bite. Her teeth clacked together. 

I do understand why she ran away. She pushed her friend, got ridiculed and laughed at and embarrassed, and in her high emotional state, she chose to flee. I’m not even going to say this is a little kid-only thing because it’s not. Adults do this sort of stuff too. But what bothers me about Essie is that she isn’t upset with her actions. She’s upset with herself for being upset. She’s angry that she wants to cry. She isn’t angry that she got tricked, no matter what words she’s saying here. She isn’t angry that she pushed her friend, embarrassing him. It’s all about Essie. It’s all about Essie’s validation. It wasn’t her fault she got tricked, right? Even though she’s known Hjordis for most of her life and knows this girl to be a bully and seems to be out to get her. She knows that anything Hjordis does to her is specifically to bully her. But she gave in anyway and did what she was told to do, even though the reasoning behind it doesn’t make any sense and Essie would know this. So what it boils down to, at least for me, is Essie has always wanted to hurt other people, but just didn’t have a good excuse for it. Hjordis gave her that excuse, and the only problem was that her action is going to have consequences because her victim was one of her friends. I know kids will turn on each other if there’s a greater reward involved, but you’re supposed to have loyalty toward your friends. You don’t suddenly turn on them because someone you know is your antagonist tells you they’re going to tell someone else not to do something that involves you, even vicariously. This just tells me that Essie has no loyalty to any of the people she calls friends.

Also, now that I think about it, it would make more sense if this story started with Essie coming back from Carth’s house after attempting to apologize and he wouldn’t accept it, they got into an argument, and that’s what sets Essie off on her temper tantrum. At least then we have some real stakes instead of Essie tantruming out of Hjordis’s party because she got “tricked” into pushing her friend. It would also make her father’s line of “you’re late” make more sense because he could have sent her out to the market to buy something they were out of and needed, or to pay for a shipment of something, and she took a detour to try and apologize. But, as usual, that didn’t happen. 

Tornac opened his mouth to say something, but at that moment, Papa came by on his way to deliver a pair of mugs to a table by the wall. He gave her a disapproving look. “My daughter isn’t making a nuisance of herself, is she, Master Tornac? She has a bad habit of pestering guests when they’re trying to eat.” 

And the reasoning why Essie isn’t supposed to talk with the customers comes out. And Essie doesn’t care. She doesn’t care if she’s being a pest, if the people she talks to don’t want to talk with her. She. Does. Not. Care. She blatantly ignores her father’s wishes because she wants to do what she wants to do, and fuck her dad because Essie is a selfish little twat well deserves to have her ass kicked. She has no respect for her father, and apparently she has no respect for anyone’s privacy, especially a stranger, because she just wants to see what she can get out of them. Remember, she stated she blatantly ignores her father’s wishes and bothers people because they call her adorable and give her candy. ESSIE IS TEN YEARS OLD AT THE LEAST. SHE IS NOT A TODDLER OR SMALL CHILD (and by small child, I mean kindergarten age the oldest. at this point, Essie should be working and she shouldn’t have time to bother the tavern’s patrons) and therefore she SHOULD KNOW BETTER. Essie has no respect for anyone. She wants what she wants, and she’s going to get it, because she’s a little sociopathic narcissist. It’s all about Essie. I mean, look at her behavior with Murtagh. She deliberately chose to sit at his table for no other reason than she felt like it, then acted all tantrumy until he asked her what was wrong. She spills her woes to him, specifically looking for sympathy and to be told it wasn’t her fault, she’s innocent, Hjordis is just a bitch, and she’s justified in acting the way she’s acting. Essie is nothing but a disrespectful, sniveling, selfish little girl who acts more like a child living in a modern century who has received little to no discipline and is extremely spoiled rather than a child living in a post-war medieval setting, where her responsibilities would have been drilled into her at a young age and she would be working in the establishment rather than running around bothering people for her own gain.

Morontagh says he’s not bothered at all. He’s been on the road for a long time with nothing and no one to talk to, so he doesn’t mind this conversation at all. He then proceeds to pull out some money to give to Essie’s dad and says maybe Pops can keep the tables around him and Essie clear of patrons. He’s expecting someone and they’ve got business to talk about.

The coins disappeared into his apron, and Papa bobbed his head. “Of course, Master Tornac.” He glanced at her again, his expression slightly concerned, and then continued on his way. 

Yeah, her father is an enabler. I can kind of understand his behavior because of a fact we’ll learn about shortly, which is that Essie was scarred due to her own negligence. Everyone blames her dad, including her dad, but the truth of the matter is that Essie was the one at fault. She was running around the kitchen, not paying attention to where she was going, and she ran into her father, who was turning around with a pot of boiling water. The way this is portrayed is that it’s Essie’s dad’s fault, everyone blames him (including himself, which is understandable), but really, it’s Essie’s, and nobody is going to make me change my mind about that. Little kid aside (I did the math - she was anywhere between three and seven years old when this happened, so she was old enough to know better, if she was seven, and if she were three, she would have been nowhere near the kitchen for this exact reason. her mother or her older sister (which she apparently has) would have been watching her, yet neither of these figures gets or takes any blame)), Essie would have been taught early on that the kitchen is dangerous and she was not to play in there, no matter the reason. If her parents were reasonably certain that Essie would disobey them and play in the kitchen anyway, then they would have one of her older siblings watch her or her mother would watch her while her older siblings helped their father. But from what I’m able to glean, her older siblings are mentioned but are never seen. Anyway, the whole reason Essie seems to act the way she does is because she knows she can play on her father’s guilt, and he’ll let her do what she wants. Essie is a spoiled brat.

Essie tells us that she suddenly feels remorse, but not for anything she’s talked about doing so far. No, she’s saying she regrets that he’ll be upset when she runs away. Because she has to leave. She’s got no choice. Right. Good luck with that. Anyway, Morontagh asks her to continue amusing him and wonders if she told him everything. Essie says yeah, that’s it. Morontagh picks up the fork from his plate and starts playing with it, and for some disturbing reason, Essie finds this “entrancing”. Morontagh says things can’t be that bad, and if she were to explain to Carth... and Essie rudely interrupts him to say:

“No,” she said, firm. She knew Carth. He wouldn’t forgive her for what she’d done. None of her friends along the docks would. They’d think she’d turned against them to join Hjordis and the other children by the castle. And in a way, she had. “He won’t understand. He won’t trust me again. They’ll hate me for it.” 

You know, this is every kid’s plight when they do something to their friends at the behest of the local bully. But the thing about it is, most of the time, if you’re really friends, YOU DON’T GIVE IN TO THE BULLY. You stand up for each other, whatever the consequences. You have loyalty to one another. You protect each other. Essie had known Hjordis long enough to know that the girl is going to be an absolute bitch to her, and they’re both old enough to know that neither of them have any real power to make adults do what they want. Except Essie is a spoiled brat, and she’s only mad because things aren’t going her way. She claims she knows Carth, and if she really thought that this would break their friendship, if she knew what she was doing to him was wrong and they really were friends, she wouldn’t have done it. Or, at the very least, would have put up something of a fight instead of just doing the deed and running away angry at herself because she was going to cry. And no, I won’t let go of that fact. She is angry because she is embarrassed and because she’s going to cry about being embarrassed. She isn’t angry because she got tricked and hurt her friend. She isn’t angry that she tried to apologize and Carth blew her off. She isn’t angry because she’s the victim in all this and life isn’t fair and she’s choosing to run away because she can’t stand to be thought of negatively by her friends. She’s angry because she’s going to cry.

The other thing that bothers me about this little paragraph is the fact that Essie is so sure that her friend - the kid she’s known since they were three and probably interacted with a hell of a lot more than she interacted with Hjordis - will hate her for pushing him and he’ll never want to be friends with her again and nobody likes her anymore. While this behavior is definitely real (because even adults deal with this), the fact that Essie claims he won’t understand why she did what she did I feel is baseless, because HE HAS TO KNOW HJORDIS IS A BULLY and that he was specifically brought to Hjordis’s house when he normally wouldn’t be invited. Seriously! Think about it! Hjordis would never interact with Carth, yet she sent her handmaid down to fetch him and attend her like she is a nobleman’s daughter, like she’s royalty, and the peasants have to wait on her hand and foot. Carth didn’t have to go with her. So why did he? Other than The Author Said So, Carth could have told the handmaid to go away! He’s a fisherman’s son, there’s nothing Hjordis or her father can do to him! Being chief mason only affords Hjordis’s father the ability to have authority over the masons, and to give input to the earl to build things. He doesn’t have any authority anywhere else and EVERYONE WOULD KNOW THAT. So the only reason I can fathom is that Hjordis said Essie was waiting for Carth to come or some other reason that got the kid to let down his guard and go to her party. I’ve already gone over this, but there’s no reason for either Carth or Essie to get invited to Hjordis’s party. Essie even says there are “other children” living by the castle, children that Hjordis would associate more than a tavern keeper’s daughter and a fisherman’s son! This doesn’t make any sense to me, and I took a child development course in college!

Morontagh then says something kind of on the nasty side, but I understand it because of the way he was treated by his supposed friends all throughout the first four books, and that something is that maybe Essie’s friends aren’t really her friends. Essie goes full temper tantrum in response:

Essie couldn’t bear the thought. “They were. You don’t understand!” And she brought her fist down on the arm of the chair in an impatient stamp. “Carth is...He’s really nice. Everyone likes him, and now they won’t like me. You wouldn’t know. You’re all big and... and old.” 

Notice how Essie is making this all about her. Wah, they won’t like me anymore because I did a bad thing! That’s not fair! Now, I understand that little kids really do think this - hell, I’ve thought it on more than one occasion myself - but I didn’t temper tantrum about it the way Essie is. Look at her physical action. She slams her fist against the arm of the chair in “an impatient stamp”. IMPATIENT. Not FRUSTRATED. Not anything that indicates she’s actually sorry for what she did and this is coming from the idea of “even if I do apologize, they’ll still hate me so why even try”. No, Essie is looking for Murtagh to take her side, to tell her she’s right and she should run away because that’s the best thing to do in this situation. What gets me about all this is that if Essie and Carth are such good friends and they both know what Hjordis is like, then Essie should know there’s no way Carth wouldn’t forgive her for trying to protect her father’s tavern, just as Essie would forgive Carth if their situations were reversed. Except this isn’t about Carth and him forgiving her for what she did. This is about Essie whining about how her life isn’t fair because she has to take responsibility for her actions and she doesn’t want to.

Morontagh’s eyebrows start climbing to his hairline like they want a better view, and he tells her she might be surprised by what he knows. He says so what if they don’t like you. What’s she going to do about it? Essie tells the audience that she doesn’t “mean to say” the words that come out of her mouth, but they just come out (I call manipulative bullshit, but that’s me) and says she’s gonna run away. Then she suddenly realizes what she says and tells Morontagh not to tell her father. Morontagh just sips some beer, fiddles with his beard, and just kind of sits there. Essie notes that he isn’t upset by her desire to flee, unlike how her father would be upset if he found out. Essie says Morontagh seems to be taking her seriously, which she likes. Because Essie is a sociopath. Morontagh asks Essie where she would go. Apparently, between temper tantruming out of Hjordis’s party and now, Essie has already figured out where she wants to run away to. This is “South, where it’s warm”. She states that there’s a caravan leaving town tomorrow, and the foreman comes to her family’s tavern. He’s nice, she says. So she’s going to sneak out and hitch a ride with the caravan to Gil’ead. Morontagh continues to fondle the fork and asks her what she’s going to do after that. Essie says:

After that, things got a bit hazy in Essie’s mind, but she knew what her ultimate goal would be. “I want to visit the Beor Mountains and see the dwarves!” she said. The thought excited her. “They made our windows. Aren’t they pretty?” She pointed.

I’m not sure if this was touched on before, but it’s really, really, really weird that the dwarves made the windows for this tavern. It’s weird on the account that the dwarves were literally myths up until a year ago, and this tavern has been in business for at least five years, because Essie got her scar in the tavern’s kitchen. I’m assuming a bit, though, when I say the tavern is likely far older than five years, only because it seems well-established within Ceunon and everyone knows it and the masons hang out there to spend money and drink. So unless the dwarves made the windows to replace the windows that were originally there, I really don’t think that happened. Unless this is just like… tell the child a tall tale so she shuts up, or acts like a town crier saying “Come visit the Fulsome Feast! The dwarves made our windows!” Also… crystal is a very weird material to make windows out of. It can be done, but it’s going to be expensive, and I’m not sure Essie’s dad could have afforded them A YEAR after the war was done. The other possibility is that the tavern dates back to before the Fall, when all the races co-mingled in the cities, and the dwarves did it as a favor or whatever, but that’s going way too in depth and thinking way too hard, which is something the author didn’t bother to do. But if he had, that would have been a nice bit of flavor text and actually give an ancientness to the story. He tried to force in that ancientness in the first four books and failed hard, and here was an opportunity. But, as usual, he didn’t take it.

Morontagh agrees that the windows are pretty, then Essie asks if he’s ever seen the Beor Mountains. He says he has, one time long ago. Essie is now even more impressed and interested in him, and she starts pestering him with questions about the mountains that he answers. Basically this culminates with her sitting back in her chair feeling dizzy after trying to picture fuck-off huge mountains and says that’s wonderful. Morontagh snorts a bit and says something random about being shot at with arrows, which is supposed to be an homage to his first wild run through the mountains with Eragon, Saphira, and Arya being hunted by Urgals, and then tells Essie that running away won’t solve her problems. Essie replies:

“Of course not,” she said. His statement seemed very obvious to her. “But if I leave, then Hjordis can’t bother me anymore.” Essie made a face. 

Because this is all about Essie. Notice that she doesn’t care if Hjordis changes her victim to Carth, supposedly Essie’s really good friend, or any of her supposed friends who live on the docks with Carth. Nope, it’s all about Essie. If Essie’s not here, then Hjordis can’t be mean to her. It’s totally okay if she’s mean to anyone else, but not Essie. She doesn’t care about anyone else. If she did, she might consider running away to solve her problems, but ultimately realize that if she leaves, all her friends become even more  vulnerable because she isn’t around to deal with Hjordis. Essie never comes to this conclusion, and ultimately she doesn’t care about anyone she calls her friends. Also it bothers me that Essie is very aware that running away won’t solve her problems, but she’s going to do it anyway because it’s all about her. Essie is a sociopathic brat.

Tornac almost looked as if he were going to laugh, but then he took another sip from his mug, and afterward he seemed more solemn. “Or, and this is just a suggestion, you could try to fix the problem instead of running away.” 

On the one hand, this is rich coming from him. At the end of Book Four, Murtagh also essentially ran away instead of facing his problems, but credit wheree credit is due, he also had much bigger issues than Essie does. His life, and Thorn’s, were essentially on the line still, they both had mental and physical abuse baggage to sort through on their own, and they couldn’t be around their love interest because Murtagh felt ashamed about what he was forced to do to her while she was in captivity. Personally, I feel like Murtagh realized Nasuada was just using him and really didn’t love him, and he needed to get out of there before he found himself in a situation he couldn’t escape from, which could have been exactly like the situation he had just escaped from. On the other hand, Murtagh is fucking right. And I’m not saying that because right now, he hasn’t fully bloomed into Morontagh yet, but because what he’s saying is right. She should fix her problems, but because she’s a sociopathic little brat, Essie is going to adamantly refuse to do anything that includes her being responsible, and instead she ultimately embraces violence to solve her problem, just like Eragon. If Eragon couldn’t solve his issues through the right application of force and magic, well, he just didn’t deal with them and let someone else do the work. Essie is the same way. Ultimately, we never find out what she does, but considering how this part ends, I’m learning toward extreme violence that could cause Essie’s parents to lose everything to try to protect her. But hey, Hjordis won’t be bothering Essie anymore, now will she?

Essie stubbornly says her problem can’t be fixed, so Morontagh turns the “what about your parents” card on her, and says that they’ll miss her, and does she really want to make them suffer?

Essie crossed her arms. This wasn’t going the way she wanted. Tornac had been agreeable so far. Why was he arguing with her now? “They have my brother and my sister and Olfa. He’s only two.” She pouted. “They wouldn’t miss me.” 

And the self-centered Paotagonist rears its ugly head. Eragon very much acted the same way toward Murtagh when he wasn’t just quietly nodding and following along with whatever Eragon wanted to do. Essie is about to go full on into temper tantrum mode because Murtagh is no longer agreeing with her every word and desire, and is rather trying to get her to think about the consequences her actions will have. This only pisses me off because Essie is NOT A LITTLE GIRL. She also isn’t a nobleman’s daughter, where she has little to no responsibilities. She is a peasant tavern keeper’s daughter who is responsible for helping her family run their business. Moreover, if she’s not helping run the business, she ought to be watching her two-year-old brother so her older siblings can help out. Of course, we don’t know how old Essie’s unnamed brother and sister are. They could be younger than her, they could be older, but they are both Sir and Mademoiselle Not Appearing In This Story. We never see them, and beyond this token mention, we don’t get to know them. This is not modern century real world where a kid decides to run away and makes it halfway down the block before they start to miss their mother and go back home. This is a medieval time period where Essie is an extra set of hands to help run her family’s business, and if she chooses to run away, there is very little chance that she gets to go back. She doesn’t know anything about this caravan she intends to hook up with. Yeah, they’re going south, but they could exploit her, they could hurt her, they could do all sorts of things to her, and she doesn’t think about any that. All she cares about is easing her own pain.

And sure, plenty of us have thought “I’ll run away from home, nobody will miss me” - I certainly did, in a darker time of my life - but that’s not true at all. Somebody will miss you. If not a parent, then a friend. If not biological family, then chosen family. But the difference between us and Essie is that Essie is choosing to run away because she made a bad choice and doesn’t want to face the consequences. The rest of us have had traumatic things happen to them (or a “my parents are so mean, I hate it at home”) which we’re trying to escape. Some of us stick to our guns and go, but others realize that the grass isn’t greener on the other side and they really had it good at home. We go back. And we realize just how much we destroyed our parents when we do and we try not to do that behavior anymore. Essie is basically like “nobody likes me, everybody hates me, guess I’ll go eat worms” and then looks around to see if anyone is going to agree with her or fall all over themselves trying to convince her to stay. I mean, look at her opening line. She crosses her arms. That is a classic angry defensive move, and not defensive in trying to protect oneself, but defensive as in “I’m mad at you because you’re not agreeing with me”. Then she throws a tantrum about how life isn’t going the way she wanted and why isn’t this strange adult agreeing with me? I know best! Sure you do, honey. 

Morontagh says he doubts that her parents won’t miss her, and then he appeals to her ego and says that Essie protected the family business. If her parents understood her sacrifice, then they would be very proud, he’s sure. Essie isn’t convinced of that, and she says that if it weren’t for her, there wouldn’t be a problem. Hey, hi, I’m the problem, it’s me, she says. If she disappears, everything will be just dandy. Then she proceeds to throw her apple core in the fireplace for no apparent reason. But the reason comes out quickly when Morontagh asks “what is that”? And we find out her throwing the apple core into the fire was the subtle segue into pointing out that Essie has a scar on her arm. Embarrassed that Morontagh has seen her scar, she pulls her sleeve down and says it’s “nothing”. Morontagh then asks to see it. Essie hesitates, but then ultimately lets him see her scar.

As gently as her mother would, Tornac pulled back the cuff of her sleeve. Essie turned her head away. She didn’t need to see the scar again—didn’t need to look to know how it crawled up her forearm all the way to her elbow. 

So the way this is played up is that Essie basically got a boiling pot of water dumped on her. The way her scar tracks is from her wrist to her elbow, which is not indicative of having a whole pot of boiling water dropped on a three year old. It’s more indicative of a bit of water being splashed on her. If she was three when a pot of boiling water landed on her, the likelihood of her dying from the shock to her system is far greater than her surviving with only a - in the grand scheme of things - a measly scar. If she was only splashed to the point it goes from her wrist to her elbow, that’s not an entire cauldron of water being tossed on her. That’s her dad bobbling the water because she ran into him and he was trying to keep it from completely falling on her. Her father is also lucky not to have walked away with massive burn scars, because if that little bit got on her, then most of it went back onto him. But that didn’t happen. It all fell on Essie. But really, it’s not that bad a scar. She could have died. She could have gotten a worse scar than what she has. Now, I don’t mind that she got scarred. I don’t mind that Essie suffered a consequence for behaving in a manner she was told not to behave in. These things should happen because actions have consequences, and some are more severe than others. What I do mind is the fact that Essie mentions siblings, and two of them could be older than she is. Because we only learn about them after Essie says nobody will miss her when she runs away because they exist, we don’t know anything about where they were when Essie was running around like a fool in the kitchen despite being told never to do that. It would be one thing to say that she escaped her mother’s or older sibling’s watch and ran through the kitchen trying to escape being caught, but that’s not what’s said. Essie herself claims that she was playing in the kitchen, ignoring the very fact her father told her not to do that, and she would have been taught not to do that. Moreover, if Essie was three when this happened, she would have been kept in the family quarters if the family lives at the tavern (which we also don’t know if they do) or she would have been kept home, being watched over by an older sibling or her mother. And if she absolutely had to come to the tavern because her mother needed to work, then she would have been made to help her mother so simple things, like changing sheets or cleaning dishes. She wouldn’t have time to run around and play.

Of course, the scar ends up being meaningless because it goes away as swiftly as it appeared, and personally, I only think of it as rewarding bad behavior. But then, Essie is a Sue arguably worse than Eragon was a Sue, and none of her behavior is ever punished. She is seen as just and right and good even though she’s a rotten, spoiled little bitch who deserves to be taken down a peg or two.

Essie tells us she hopes nobody else in the common room notices her scar, and trust me babe, nobody does, because nobody gives a fuck, including me. Anyway, Morontagh eventually pulls her sleeve back down (but doesn’t release her arm, even though I guess it’s implied he does) and says her scar is impressive and she should be proud of it. Yeah, watch him walk back his words at the very end of this section. Essie asks why she should be proud of the scar, because it’s ugly and she hates it.

A faint smile played around the corners of his lips. “Because a scar means you survived. It means you’re tough and hard to kill. It means you lived. A scar is something to admire.” 

This will heel turn quickly by the end of this story. Sure, this is all true and a good message, really, but it gets ruined by the fact there’s another message being sent - “scars make you ugly and if you can remove them, you should because then you won’t be ugly anymore”. As someone who has several scars myself, let me assure you, scars DO NOT MAKE YOU UGLY. You know what makes you ugly? YOUR ATTITUDE AND HOW YOU TREAT PEOPLE. You can be the most beautiful person in the world, sexy as all get out, but if you treat people like they’re shit on your shoes and you are the Queen Karen to end all Karens, your physical beauty DOES NOT MATTER FOR YOU ARE AN UGLY PERSON AND SHOULD BE ASHAMED OF YOURSELF. Of course, we should all treat people how we would like to be treated, but people have the arrogance and unmitigated gall to be mean to people for no real reason other than, I think, because they can and are in such a position where they believe they can get away with it, and they do get away with it. Literary case in point, Eragon treats Murtagh like shit and gets away with it not only because the author said so, but because Murtagh lets him get away with it. Especially in Murtagh, he talks about how Eragon was so good to him, even though it’s only been A YEAR since Eragon said “let me kill you” at the Battle of the Burning Plains, and then treated him like shit throughout the rest of the story. Murtagh should remember this, especially because not all scars are physical and can be seen. But because Eragon and Essie are Sues, they get away with treating people like crap, and people beg them for more. And also because they’re Sues, they can’t be horribly disfigured in any way. So, ultimately, this but if the exchange is pointless.

“You’re wrong,” said Essie. She pointed at the pot with the painted bluebells on the mantel—the one Auntie Helna had given them last winter, the one Essie had knocked onto the floor a few moons back. A long crack ran from the lip of the pot to the base. “It just means you’re broken.” 

For fucks’ sake, you’re not dead! Stop acting like getting a scar is tantamount to being buried six feet under. You’re not broken. Scars do not equal physical limitations. They do not equal inability to do anything. Most of the time, you’ve got a story to tell about how you survived something that should have killed you but didn’t, and sure, a lot of the time you feel embarrassed and think you’re worthless because of those marks, and a lot of the scarring isn’t just physical but mental and emotional, but having a scar DOES NOT MAKE YOU BROKEN OR WORTHLESS OR UNLOVED OR ANYTHING NEGATIVE. You lived. You survived. You bounced back and became stronger. Your scars don’t define you. Your attitude does. However, that’s not the message that’s said at the end of this section. Instead, Essie basically gets to have her cake and eat it too, and she learns nothing except that she no longer has to live with her embarrassment. She doesn’t learn any lessons. Kind of like Eragon, now that I think about it.

Morontagh says that if you works very hard, sometimes you can mend a break so that it’s stronger than before, and Essie goes full on brat mode again.

Essie wasn’t liking their conversation as much as she had earlier. She crossed her arms, tucking her left hand into her armpit. “Hjordis and the others always make fun of me for it,” she mumbled. “They say my arm is as red as a snapper, and that I’ll never get a husband because of it.” 

She’s fucking six or ten! Why the fuck is she worried about a husband at TEN?! Moreover, if this burn happened three years ago, then it still shouldn’t be red. If it’s red, then this scar happened far more recently than what Essie is telling us. After THREE YEARS her scar should be pale. It could still be twisted, or whatever, because that’s how the skin healed, but it wouldn’t be RED. If it’s red is FRESH. It takes eighteen months (a year and a half) for ALL scars to heal, including burn wounds. But this also is a world where magic exists, and even if her parents couldn’t scrape up enough money to have Essie healed to the point that she wouldn’t have a scar, they certainly would have done whatever they could to heal her faster than it would take for a burn scar to heal naturally. Essie was anywhere between three and seven when she received this injury, and such an injury would be very traumatic for her! She would have been screaming and crying for days every time she moved her arm unless she was healed by magic. She would want nothing to do with the kitchen, maybe nothing to do with her father since he’s the one who spilled water on her after she ran into him, knowing that she wasn’t allowed to play in the kitchen and she did it anyway. Yet Essie shows no signs of trauma or irrational fear of water. She’s more concerned with the fact the scar, which you can only see if she’s not wearing long sleeves and is only from her wrist to her elbow, not her whole fucking body (which it should have been!), won’t get her a husband. Dude, if the guy loves you, he’s going to love you scars and all! Unless he’s looking at you just for your perfect beauty (which, let’s face it, that’s probably all it’s about because this is Paolini we’re talking about) then he doesn’t care about you as a person. He either sees a payday or he’s looking for a publicity wife. You know the one, where he only marries her so it makes him look good. I’m also no longer surprised that Essie is all tantrumy now because the conversation isn’t about telling her how right she is and she’s totally awesome for choosing to be so self-sacrificing. 

Morontagh asks Essie what her parents say about it, and she makes a face because she’s an ungrateful brat and says that her parents say it doesn’t matter, but she starts phishing for some validation when she asks Morontagh “but that’s not true, is it?” He replies:

Tornac inclined his head. “No. I suppose it isn’t. Your parents are doing their best to protect you, though.” 

God, I want to smack you, Murtagh. On the one hand, he’s probably speaking from a little experience considering the scar his father gave him became the identifier that got him locked up with the Varden and ultimately got him kidnapped, tortured, and then disowned by his own half-brother. On the other, IT DOESN’T MATTER. Like I said earlier, if a potential suitor is looking at you, it’s because they’re genuinely interested in you as a person, not what you look like. If they’re only after you for looks, then there’s some nefarious motive that they’ve got and you’re a cog in their scheme. Besides that, Essie is a child. There’s no reason she should be whining about not getting a husband, unless we’re suggesting that there’s child brides in Ceunon. Essie is still at an age where boys are either icky and full of cooties or they’re just friends. She shouldn’t be worrying about this. (Of course, there are no alternate lifestyles in Alagaesia, so maybe her worrying about getting married at this age is based on that fact.) The point is, in five years, in ten years, that scar isn’t going to be looking the way it does now. Not that it matters, because it gets magically removed, but Essie is worrying about the wrong things. She’s a typical sociopath - it’s all about her. Essie only cares about Essie. She doesn’t care about anyone else.

Mini Spite-fic time!

“Carth! Carth!”

Carth turned slowly to see Essie running up the docks toward him, a broad smile on her face. He sighed inwardly and wondered what she wanted now. It had been nearly a month since she had pushed him into a horse trough at Hjordis’s party and he hadn’t seen hide nor hair of her until now. Turning his attention back to the net he was mending, Carth breathed deep and long to keep his heart from beating faster, to keep the heat that suffused his limbs from reaching his tongue and loosening it. He had thought about all the things he would tell Essie when she got over her own embarrassment and came to apologize to him, but she never had. She had run from the party the moment after she’d pushed him and, according to Tamman, who delivered provisions to the Fulsome Feast every other day, Essie hadn’t felt the least bit sorry for what she had done to him, only what had happened to her.

He wanted to give Essie the benefit of a doubt, because he’d known her since they were three. Now that they were ten, and now that a month had passed since Hjordis’s party, the things that Carth had overlooked because of their friendship had become scrutinized to the point that Carth had realized the two options that lay before him, and neither were exactly pleasant. He’d even asked his father what he should do, since his father enjoyed going to the Fulsome Feast to drink after a hard day’s fishing and he hadn’t wanted to spoil one of his father’s pleasures. His father had only told him “Follow your heart. It knows what’s right.”

“Right” wasn’t always “good” or “happy”. Sometimes “right” was painful. Hurtful. But Carth had a feeling that this was going to hurt him more than it was going to hurt Essie.

She came to a bouncing stop beside him, folding her hands behind her back and leaning toward him almost conspiratorially. Out of the corner of his eye, Carth saw Essie’s bare arms - and was alarmed to see that no scar graced her left wrist or arm. He stood up immediately, making her gasp and draw back, and he grabbed hold of her left hand. He ran his fingers over her skin from elbow to wrist, but there was nothing but smooth flesh under his fingers. No puckered skin, no off-color patches, just a small red S-shape where the scar had been but beyond that? Nothing.

“What-“ he started, meeting her eyes.

Essie only beamed. “Isn’t it wonderful? It happened a month ago, didn’t you hear? A traveler in Papa’s tavern did it! I’m beautiful now!”

“Essie, you were beautiful before.” Carth replied, releasing her hand.

“Oh, no, of course I wasn’t! But I am now and that’s all that matters!” She grinned widely, then reached for the leather thong she wore around her waist. “And look! The stranger also gave me this!” She presented to him a fork, her eyes glinting with something cruel. “Now Hjordis can’t bully me anymore. If she does, Mr. Stabby will have the perfect comeback. She’ll be the one crying next time!”

Carth took a step back, clutching at his own shirt to keep his hands from shaking. “Why would you name that thing? Why would you hurt Hjordis with it? I know how mean she is, but she doesn’t deserve that.”

Essie narrowed her eyes at him and pointed Mr. Stabby toward him. “Hjordis deserves this and more for what she did to me. For how she embarrassed me. I’m beautiful and strong and powerful and she’s going to know it.”

“That doesn’t make you any better than her.”

Essie scoffed. “I have Mr. Stabby. She’ll have to be nice to me now or I’ll stick her.” She gave him a long look that made him want to run and hide behind his father and mother. “Are you taking Hjordis’s side now, Carth? I thought we were friends.”

Be brave. Be brave. Jump into the water if you have to. You can swim. She can’t. Carth took a deep breath and said, “We were. But not anymore.”

Essie froze, her face twisting up into something ugly for a moment. Carth watched her bite her lip until she broke skin and her eyes watered with tears that had nothing to do with a broken heart. “What do you mean? Of course we’re friends!”

“Friends apologize for hurting each other.” Carth said, a little harsher than he intended.

The tears immediately stopped. “I didn’t hurt you. Hjordis did. She tricked me into it! If I hadn’t, then she would’ve told her father not to come to the Fulsome Feast and-“

“You and I both know she couldn’t tell her father not to do anything.” Carth snapped, standing up a little straighter and releasing his shirt. His hands no longer shook. “You could have seriously hurt me that day, but you just stared at me with a smile on your face until Hjordis and her friends started laughing at you. You didn’t even spare me a look before you stomped out of there. And don’t you dare say you ran, because I was there and I watched you. I know what a temper tantrum of yours looks like. I’ve seen them all my life when something doesn’t go your way. I didn’t think anything of it before because, well, you were my friend, but I won’t ignore them anymore.”

Essie stamped her foot and crossed her arms over her chest. “I meant to come apologize, but things happened and-“

“For a month, Essie?”

She huffed and glowered at him. “Well, I had important things to do!”

“Name one.”

Her glare intensified and her arms dropped to her sides. Her fingers tightened around Mr. Stabby. Carth felt sweat dripping between his shoulders as that fork twitched in her grip. It took every ounce of bravery he had not to turn and run. Essie finally looked away from him and stamped her foot, a frown growing on her face. “I mean,” she finally said, looking back at him, “the fight was really scary and Papa was hurt and everything and I got my scar removed and it was the best thing that ever happened to me.”

Carth sighed. She didn’t understand, and he realized that she would never understand. “You don’t care about anyone but yourself.” He said sadly. Essie started to protest but Carth shook his head. “Essie, if we really were friends, you would have come apologized to me the next day or even a week after. If you really cared about me, you wouldn’t have done what you did. If I was really your friend, you wouldn’t have come today and talked about everything you got. You would have apologized to me for pushing me, because you were my friend. I wouldn’t even be mad at you for why. But I haven’t even heard one apology from you all this time. It’s just about you.”

Essie’s eyes turned dark as her face became ugly with a sneer. “Why should I apologize to you for making me so miserable?”

Carth choked out a laugh. It hurt. “Made you miserable, how? For telling you you’re selfish? For telling you the truth? Essie, if you value our friendship, just say you’re sorry for pushing me that day.” He was pleading, which was foolish.

Essie stamped her feet and her cheeks blazed with color. Her hand tightened around the fork and she lifted it to point Mr. Stabby at him. “If you valued me, you would just understand! I’m the one who got tricked, I’m the one who got laughed at, I’m the one who deserves an apology!”

Carth took a step back. His spine stiffened. His chest tightened. He raised his chin in defiance. “Maybe so, but not from me. Until you apologize for what you did to me, we can’t be friends anymore.”

“That’s not fair!” Essie shrieked.

Carth picked up his net and carefully folded it in his arms. “It is to me, because I was hurt too. You hurt my feelings, and you don’t even seem to care. So until you say you’re sorry, we aren’t friends.”

“You can’t say that! That isn’t fair! It’s all Hjordis’s fault! I didn’t do anything wrong!”

Carth looked at her. Essie’s eyes were bright with angry tears, her jaw clenched and her fist right around her fork. Then he walked away.

“Carth! I thought you’d understand! We’re friends!”

He stopped and half turned to look at Essie over his shoulder. “Not anymore.”

Her shriek of frustration echoed in his ears as he walked down the dock, but Carth walked with his head held high and his heart lighter.

That was a little longer than I anticipated, but still. The point is, Essie is always being catered to as far as this story is concerned. She isn’t held responsible for any of her choices and actions. We’re just supposed to forgive her because she’s Essie. Like how we were just supposed to forgive Eragon for his awful behavior because he was the hero.

Essie starts to get huffy and says her parents can’t protect her. She notices that Morontagh seems to have a dark expression on his face, but it’s not directed toward her, because this is all about Essie and Essie is the only one Essie cares about. Then she asks if Morontagh has any scars. He does, and points at one on his chin, describes where he got it, and we see a bit of affection on his face, because we realize that the scar was given to him by Thorn when they were fooling around. Then he asks what happened to Essie’s arm. Essie takes a while to answer, because she goes down memory lane and talks about how all she can see is the kitchen from three years ago and her mother’s screaming. She finally says that it was an accident. A pot of hot water fell on her arm. Morontagh is dubious and is like, it just fell onto you? I’m sure you can imagine the tone, that “I don’t believe you” tone people ask when you say you got that black eye from falling down the stairs when they all know - or believe - that you’re being abused somehow. Essie just responds with a nod because she doesn’t want to throw her father under that Greyhound bus by saying he bumped her, even though that’s not what happened at all. She goes on to selflessly claim that it wasn’t her father’s fault, no not at all! She had been the one running around the kitchen and he hadn’t seen her, and Essie’s sure he feels bad for what happened.

Morontagh just makes a noise and stares at the fire now, and then Essie pushes everything that might indicate she was at fault for her injury out of her head and asks him where he came from. He says a long way from here. They start talking about the south as being from whence Morontagh has come from, and Essie starts prying for information so she can be comfortable when she runs away. Because heaven forbid a Sue not be catered to when they do something irresponsible. Morontagh describes the south, we don’t care, and Essie asks if there’s monsters. Of course there are monsters, there are always monsters, and some monsters are human. Morontagh then says that he ran away from home himself, and Essie is all shocked, and Morontagh starts trying to tell her that running away isn’t the answer before he’s interrupted by our newest arrival. The guy is described, but all you really need to know is that he’s a dead man walking. Essie instantly hates the guy, and everything about him screams “he’s evil!” to her.

This guy is named Sarros by Morontagh, and even Morontagh doesn’t like the guy. He basically tells Sarros that he’s late. Sarros says places are dangerous, then takes a chair and sets it between Essie and Morontagh. Remember this for later, it’ll be important for physics reasons. Essie then notices that some other guys have come into the bar, six total. They look like thugs, and she mentions Papa often has to throw thugs like this out because they disturb the peace. Her father also reenters the scene, artfully placed by the bar where he can watch everything. He pulls out his truncheon and sets it on the counter, which makes Essie feel safe. Her dad has used this truncheon to beat people silly. Sarros says the first intelligent thing in this section so far, which is for Morontagh to send Essie away. However, Morontagh, being well, a moron, elects to have Essie stay. He makes it her choice, though, by saying she might learn something, if she’s interested.

No. She won’t. Get rid of her. Send her off. Even if she had to be involved with what comes next, she could have been involved in a different way.

Anyway, Essie chooses not to move because she’s curious now, and she can’t help but remember those “bad omens” that she opened the story with. She decides that if she does leave, something bad will happen to Morontagh. No, it happens because you’re there. Also no, it would’ve happened anyway,  whether you were there or not. This is where the story really starts to get stupid. Sarros basically says Morontagh is an idiot, and he’s right, but whatever, do what you want, I’m not gonna argue. Morontagh says no, you won’t argue, and then demands to know what Sarros found. Apparently it’s been three months since he hired the guy. Sarros says yeah, whatever, three months. I told you, the place is dangerous. But he found what Morontagh is after, and he pulls out a fist-sized chunk of something that he drops onto the table. Both Essie and Morontagh lean forward to inspect it. It’s a rock, but it has a shine to it that Essie’s never seen before, like it’s still on fire. She sniffs it and recoils because it smells like a rotten egg.

So it’s a volcanic rock that still smells of sulfur. Big mystery there. But of course it’s a mystery because nobody in this room knows what it is! Morontagh even asks what that is. Sarros shrugs and says he’s only got suspicions, but Morontagh wanted something unusual, and there you go. Morontagh wants to know if there were more, and yeah, there were. Or so Sarros was told. They blah blah about the rocks for a minute, it’s not important, and then Essie asks where the rock came from. Sarros smiles and shows off his sharp pointy teeth - which are sharp and pointy for no fucking reason other than, from what I can tell, to highlight how eeeeeeeevvvviiiiillll this guy is - and Essie says his smile disgusts her more than it scares her, because Essie is a sociopathic brat and doesn’t feel fear. He then says that’s “the nub of it”, which answers absolutely nothing. Morontagh reaches for the rock, but Sarros stops him by putting his own hand over it and telling him to pay up first.

So Morontagh does so, pulling out a pouch and tossing it on the table. Which is stupid of him, and we’ll soon find out why. Sarros grabs the pouch and checks it, and Essie tells us she sees a “yellow gleam” inside the pouch and instantly recognizes it as gold. She proceeds to tell us that she’s never seen so much as a whole crown before. Morontagh says that Sarros gets half now and the rest when he says where he got the rock. Sarros starts laughing and in true typical B-movie villain fashion, he says oh, no, you’re gonna give us all your money and we’ll let you walk away with your life. Which is like... the most predictable thing to ever happen in situations like this. Also in true B-movie villain fashion, the six thugs in an obviously choreographed motion all put their hands under their cloaks, and Essie tells us she sees swords. 

Now, remember that thing I asked you to remember? The whole physics issue? Here it comes.

She stiffened and, panicked, looked to her father. A guest had distracted him: one of the laborers from the docks stood leaning against the bar, chattering away. She opened her mouth and was about to cry out a warning when Sarros drew a thin-bladed knife and pressed it against her throat. 

So the way I’ve pictured this is based on what we were told earlier - that Sarros is sitting FACING Murtagh and Essie, but between them, which means he has to lean over a certain distance in order to reach Essie, who has also leaned forward to see the rock in Sarros’s hands. Therefore, Sarros is at a complete disadvantage based on positioning at the moment. Essie could easily escape him by leaning backwards. Murtagh could easily disarm him by throwing himself at Sarros before the man can lunge at Essie to take her captive. It isn’t like the guy stepped behind her and put his knife to her throat that way, giving him leverage over both her and Murtagh. No, he’s literally bent over at the waist to put this knife at her throat, which means he’s off-balance and he wouldn’t be able to react before Essie tried to back away from him or knock her chair back to escape from him. Of course, that doesn’t happen because we have to have this stupid fight scene, so Essie is reduced to a damsel in distress that doesn’t contribute overly much to anything. Yet she still gets rewarded at the end, for some reason I can’t even begin to fathom. Essie’s behavior thus far, to me, doesn’t seem like she should be rewarded, and I can’t even suspend my belief enough to say that Murtagh was just trying to be nice. Methinks that Paolini forgot his whole spiel about scars being proof of strength - or he just wanted his new Sue to be beautiful, because if Murtagh has the power to remove scars, why doesn’t he ever remove his own? Seems kind of contradictory to his ethos.   

Sarros threatens Essie with the knife and says if she so much as peeps he’ll slit her throat. Because he’s a bad guy, you know. Essie suddenly is afraid, so so afraid, and then she realizes all her previous worries aren’t so important after all. This suddenly jumps to “Daddy! Daddy can save me!” but only if he knows Essie’s in trouble. She looks toward the bar, somehow hoping her father can suddenly read minds. The scene jumps from this to Morontagh, who is angry but you wouldn’t know it except for his eyes, and asks Sarros why the guy feels like betraying him. He’s being paid well, after all. More villain dialogue comes out of Sarros’s mouth, saying the money’s the point. If Morontagh is willing to flash a pouch full of gold coins for a stupid rock, then he’s got to have more, and the villain wants it.

Because Sarros is your typical thug who is only focused on money and getting it now.

Essie suddenly is back in the scene, and she’s apparently considering kicking Sarros in the shin. But the knife is too scary for her to even try. Even though by rights she shouldn’t even be able to reach his shin, because he’s bent over at the waist with the knife at her throat, and her legs should be too short to reach anything if she doesn’t plan on moving. Anyway, Morontagh mutters something under his breath that Essie hears, then he says that Sarros doesn’t want to fight him. Just tell him where the rock was found, take the money, and go. Nobody has to get hurt. Sarros says:

“What fight?” said Sarros, and cackled. “You have no sword on you. We are six, and you are one. The coin is ours whether you wish it or not.” Essie stiffened as the steel bit into her neck, a bright little slice of pain. “See?” said Sarros. “I make the choice easy for you, Wanderer. Hand over the rest of your gold, or the youngling here will pay with blood.” 

And the B-movie villain has tipped his hand and did what every self-respecting villain knows not to do - get greedy. Because that’s this boils down to, after all. Murtagh was an idiot who threw around a lot of gold (although how he has so much money is beyond me, he’s supposed to be off finding himself, so he should barely have a coin to his name) and Sarros wants it all. Because reasons. He’s already got more gold than he’s likely to see in a lifetime, and what is he going to do with the rest of it? Drink himself stupid? Visit a house of lady favors? Eat until his stomach bursts? What does he even do aside from being a mercenary or whatever he is? Even mercenaries know not to bite the hand that feeds them because if they do, then they run out of clients and with no clients, there’s no money. Then they starve. Or turn into a bandit, or whatever. Or they get a legitimate job as a CPA. I dunno. The point is, this is very quickly turning into a straight-to-tv movie where the minor villain inexplicably grabs hold of the Idiot Ball and turns on the hero just to have a fight scene where the minor villain ends up getting their ass kicked. Or gets killed.

Essie turns her attention to Morontagh, expecting him to pull out a hidden dagger and be a hero. Because he seems like that kind of person. She wants him to rescue her. Because, remember, this is all about Essie. Notice how she isn’t pissed at him that her being in this situation is his fault because he had her stay. However, instead of doing anything like heroic swashbuckling, Morontagh just starts to talk. Whatever he says makes the air in front of him “shiver” but otherwise nothing else happens. Essie pulls the selfish “you’re not helping!” card on him, because he isn’t immediately jumping to her rescue like a gallant knight. Sarros laughs and calls Morontagh foolish. He reveals a bird-skull amulet and shows it to Morontagh before proudly proclaiming that “the witch-woman Bachel” charmed one of these things for him and his thugs, and Morontagh’s magic can’t help him now, har har har! They’re protected against all “evilness”! Right, sure, uh-huh.

Morontagh goes “you sure about that” and speaks a “Word” - yes, it’s even capitalized in the text, even though our narrator Essie should have no idea the significance of said Word, she’s still capitalizing the W anyway - and Essie describes it as being such a “word” - lower case this time - that it rings like a bell and she can see infinite meanings in the sound of said word, but she can’t remember the “Word” - capitalized this time - no matter how hard she tries. There’s silence after this, and everyone in the common room turns to look at Morontagh, like they’ve just been awoken from a deep sleep. Essie is so amazed that Morontagh used magic that she almost forgets that she’s supposed to be afraid. Because she’s a sociopath and can’t feel anything unless she pretends it. She blah blahs on about how nobody gets to use magic these days, unless they have express approval from the queen’s magic gestapo. However, out of nowhere, Essie - who has indeed forgotten she’s supposed to be afraid for her life right now - tells the audience that she has “always wanted” to see magic up close and personal.

Well, despite Morontagh’s best efforts so far, Sarros seems unaffected, and now Morontagh is starting to look worried. Essie’s dad finally notices that she’s in trouble, so he grabs his truncheon and jumps over the bar - spry guy, ain’t he? - and demands that she be let go. But before he can go any farther, two of Sarros’s thugs charge him and knock him to the floor before hitting him in the head with the pommel of a sword. Her father immediately drops his weapon and just lays there, because clearly we all have an “off” button on our heads. After this, nobody else dares to move.

“Papa!” Essie cried. If not for the knife at her throat, she would have rushed to his side. She’d never seen her father lose a fight before, and the sight of him on the floor removed any last sense of safety. 

I was debating on whether or not saying something about this, but the more I thought about it, the more amusing the second line of the paragraph became. I get that Essie is only supposed to be anywhere between seven and ten years old. A little girl. Therefore, she should be pissing her pants terrified about that knife at her throat. But she isn’t. She’s only mildly concerned about it, and she isn’t scared to the point she can’t form a coherent thought, or she’s looking around for help, or bawling her eyes out, or any normal response a CHILD would have to a situation such as the one Essie is in. Sure, we can argue that maybe she was desensitized to such stuff because of the war that happened A YEAR AGO, but from the looks of things about the city, no one seems to have an issue with the fact the war visited them in the shape of unbeatable, terrifying elves, and indeed, nobody ever seems to mention that fact. Nobody mentions watching these strange human-esque creatures that haven’t been seen in nigh on a hundred years melt out of the forest and swarm the city walls, killing any who resist, civilian or military. Nobody talks about that horror. Essie could have seen enough violence and death at that point to make her think it’s a normal, every day thing. On the other hand, Essie has talked about how she genuinely cares for her father, to the point that her physical action of pushing Carth into the horse trough was done to protect her father and her father’s business. She physically assaulted her friend because she believed that if she didn’t, her father’s tavern would be at risk of shutting its doors. However, right here, Essie goes “well, if my life wasn’t in danger, I’d totally go to my dad’s side to make sure he was okay.” If she was so hung-ho about pushing Carth to save her father’s business, she should be just as gung-ho about risking her life to protect her father. Yet she doesn’t do that. She sits there and whines about it. A true heroine would go “fuck that knife”, probably kick Sarros in the balls if she could reach them, and then bolt to her father. Honestly, that would be a better start to the fight than Murtagh casting a spell on his fucking fork.

I mean, think about it. Essie kicks Sarros or shoves his knife hand away from her, leaps up to run to her father. Sarros recovers and tries to stab Essie, but Murtagh intervenes, and if the fork has to be there, then he could catch the dagger with the fork. After that, the fight could still happen as it does (even though it’s so stupid) but at least Essie is proactive in her escape, and Murtagh’s not standing there with his thumb up his ass waiting for Sarros to deliver the Evil Taunting Speech that Inevitably Causes The Hero to Win. He’s diving in to protect Essie, who was involved because of his own hubris, and he actually seems somewhat like the Murtagh we all love and not Morontagh who replaced him. That whole explosion of action would be so much more fun to read than the Evil Monologue/Pretentious Hero Monologue written here.

Sarros laughs again and says that Morontagh’s tricks won’t help him. Nobody’s as strong as Bachel. This is otherwise known as Evil Villain Monologue Right Before the Hero Kicks Villain’s Ass. True to form, Morontagh goes, okay, fine, and picks up the fork again to start playing with it all calm again, which Essie says she can’t understand why he’s so calm, and Morontagh says he apparently has no choice now. Sarros says no, you don’t. Suddenly Essie’s mom appears on scene and starts to ask what the hell is going on before she sees Sarros holding a knife to her daughter’s throat and her husband lying on the floor with a pair of sword-wielding thugs over him, and she starts to freak out. One of the thugs tells her not to do that or her husband’s gonna get it, so you know that guy is going to die. Essie tells us that she’s the only one not distracted by her mother’s appearance - even though she just got done describing her mother’s appearance - so she’s the only one who sees Morontagh’s lips move and the fork vibrate. She claims if she had blinked, she would have missed it. Sarros slaps the table... with what? His third hand? His foot? Because last I saw he had a hand occupied by the knife at Essie’s throat and a hand occupied by the money pouch. Anyway, yeah, he slaps the table and tells Morontagh to shut up and cough up all his dough. And then Morontagh does this:

Tornac tipped his head and—with his left hand—again reached under his cloak. One moment he was sitting, seemingly relaxed. Then he moved faster than Essie could follow. His cloak swung through the air, sending a rush of wind into her face, and his fork flashed across the table, and she heard a ting! as it knocked the knife free of Sarros’s grip and sent the weapon flying into the log wall. 

Yeah…. Noooooo. Unless we’re following Hollywood Movie Magic Logic - which we shouldn’t because this isn’t a movie, this is supposed to be reality - this shouldn’t be happening. First of all, they’re all sitting. Sarros isn’t holding Essie to his chest with a knife at her throat; he’s leaning forward to press the knife to her throat, making his own throat, face, and arm that much more vulnerable to Murtagh’s counter attack. Murtagh and Essie are also sitting, so unless Murtagh is standing up at the same time he’s throwing his cloak, there’s no way he’s getting enough momentum to throw such a heavy garment and get enough leverage to throw the fork the way he does. Of course, in the next paragraph, we find out that Murtagh is still sitting, which means that Paolini has once again destroyed physics and reality in order to get his “cool” (and I say that with as much disdain as possible) fight scene. The way the three are positioned shouldn’t allow Murtagh to do any of this, unless his intention is to blind Sarros with the cloak so he can grab Essie and pull her away from the knife, or so he could lunge at Sarros and shove him away from Essie. Murtagh throwing the fork - or rather, he lashes out with the fork to send the knife flying across the room to stick into the wall, which again wouldn’t happen unless Sarros’s fingers were coated in butter or something - would be immediately telegraphed so Sarros would be able to get out of the way. It would make far more sense for Murtagh to lunge at Sarros and tackle him to the ground, wrestle the knife away from him and then throw it. But that wouldn’t be “cool” now would it? I would even buy him jumping across the table to grab Essie and pull her away, since Sarros is no position to retaliate quickly. Unless, of course, the whole “cloak flying through the air” description is just it flying back as he flings his arm so he can use the fork to knock the knife away, which also doesn’t make any sense according to physics. Either way, this is just dumb.

Like I mentioned, Morontagh is still sitting, but with his arm extended, and he’s holding the fork now to Sarros’s chin. Sarros finally realizes his goose is cooked and starts to sweat.

Essie still didn’t dare move; Sarros’s hand was next to her neck, fingers spread wide as if to tear out her throat. 

Okay… so let me get this straight… Murtagh has just used a fork to knock a knife out of Sarros’s hand with enough force to send that knife into the far wall where it is now stuck, and the guy’s hand is still at Essie’s throat? He didn’t snatch his hand back? He didn’t try to go into a retreat, and was stopped only because Murtagh swung that fork back at his throat? He’s just sitting there, reaching out at Essie’s neck, with a fork stuck at his own throat? That… doesn’t make any sense to me. There’s no way his hand should just be there at Essie’s throat, making squiggle-fingers like he wants to choke the life out of her. This not how this works. This is not how any of this works.

Morontagh then tips his hand and says that just because the little charm Sarros has stops him from using magic on a person, it doesn’t stop him from using it on something else. Like the fork. Morontagh presses the fork deeper into Sarros’s skin and asks if he really believes that Morontagh needs a sword to defeat him, and he calls Sarros names. Because obligatory Hero Monologue Before the Fight Scene.

Sarros hissed. Then he shoved Essie into Tornac’s lap and sprang backward, knocking his chair over. 

This doesn’t make sense either because Essie was sitting across from Sarros, such that he had to lean forward to put a knife to her throat. Essie was sitting next to Murtagh with a table between them. Unless Sarros threw Essie over the table or grabbed her, pulled her from her chair, and then threw her at Murtagh, this doesn’t make sense. Unless Essie can phase through physical objects much like Black Cat from the X-men. Which I don’t think she can do, so did the table just disappear? Or did Paolini forget the layout of the situation? Did he forget physics? The answer feels like a resounding yes, because he has a track record of failing physics in his previous works, and it seems the problem has carried over into this story. It would make more sense if Sarros grabbed Essie to use her as a shield, or if he shoved her backwards into her own chair, but that doesn’t happen. 

Essie falls to the floor and starts scrambling around under the tables until she gets to her mom. Around her, there’s nothing but chaos but we don’t get to see any of it. Once Essie reaches her mom, her mom just pulls her behind her and grabs a chair to use as a weapon or shield or both. Now we get to see the fight scene, and it’s as ridiculous as you might expect. The innocents are trying to get out of the way, the thugs are drawing their swords and trying to box Morontagh in, but he’s having none of it, or so Essie tells us. Morontagh has abandoned his cloak and is now stalking around the room, and she again compares him to a cat. Sarros, in true B-movie villain fashion, has removed himself from the fray to a corner and starts screaming at his thugs to kill Morontagh. So the fight starts, and suffice to say Morontagh defeats the first guy by killing the guy with the fork to the chest. Even though that probably wouldn’t actually kill someone in reality, unless we’re suggesting this is a medieval fork, which actually could kill someone, and not a more modern fork, which I think is what most people are thinking this fork is. Anyway, Essie says she’s seen plenty of fights, but nothing like this. She’s doubly scared because of what she’s seeing, or so she tells us. I don’t buy it. She starts looking for her dad, spotting him crawling toward the bar. She cries out for him, but he doesn’t hear her.

Three thugs now attack Morontagh, and specific mention is given to how the three attack at the same time, rather than “waiting for the others to take their turn”, which is how real life fights actually work. I feel like this is a dig at movie fights where everyone takes their turn to attack the hero, but also I might be reading too much into it. It does, however, also feel like an unintentional bow to Morontagh, saying he can totally fight three guys at one time, whereas Eragon always made sure to be one on one if he couldn’t use his fancy Sue-per powers to win against a group. Anyway, since this is a three on one fight at the moment, Morontagh grabs a chair and smashes it against one guy, while at the same time, he uses the fork to fight off the other two thugs. Despite the advantage of reach with swords, Morontagh says yeah, fuck that, and easily sidesteps all the swords and murders the thugs one, two, three, four with the fork. 

Four? I thought he was fighting three guys? Oh, and they’re not dead, apparently. They’re just knocked out of the fight, because they’re on the ground groaning.

Suddenly we’re jerked to the sight of Essie’s dad, who’s made it to the bar, with the truncheon in hand. ...Didn’t he drop it when he got hit in the head a while ago? When did he pick it up? The narrator says that the truncheon is useless in the face of swords, so, thanks Essie for having so much confidence in your father. Essie’s mother suddenly tells her that “Olfa” - who, if you remember is Essie’s little brother, who is TWO - is in the kitchen, and I have to ask why a TWO YEAR OLD is in the kitchen NOW UNSUPERVISED, but it doesn’t matter, because Olfa doesn’t matter, and that her mother wants her to... but before her mother can finish, one of the thugs runs at her and takes a swing at her with the mace he holds. This knocks the chair out of her mother’s hands and smashes the chair to pieces.

Suddenly Essie tells us she feels “small” and “helpless” in the face of this. She tells us her dad’s too far away to be useful and her mother might as well not exist because she can’t do anything to stop the guy who’s about to stab her - and notice Essie seems to be doing absolutely nothing but hiding behind her mom, seemingly expecting her mother to die protecting her, even though she doesn’t say that outright - when this happens:

Thud.

The man’s eyes rolled until they showed white, and then he collapsed, and Essie saw the fork sticking out from the back of his head. 

Do you know how hard a human skull is? Do you know the kind of force that it would take to kill someone by throwing a goddamned fork across the room? Even as a Rider, Murtagh with his arms alone would NOT BE ABLE TO GENERATE THAT KIND OF FORCE. We’re talking the same kind of force that an arrow shot from a longbow has to generate to pierce the skull and go through the brain. The same kind of force a rebar would have to generate to go through the skull and into the brain. We’re talking Herculean levels of strength to generate enough strength to cause the tines of a fork (and this is a medieval fork with two tines, although to be fair, the fork is never described, so it could be a more modern three-tined fork) to pierce a human skull and penetrate far enough into the brain to kill someone. This is pure movie magic. Now, I could see Murtagh having enough strength just on the grace of being a Rider to throw it with such force and accuracy that it does indeed hit the guy in the skull, but not penetrate it enough to kill the guy. Knock him down, certainly. Give him a huge honker of a headache, of course. Make him decide playing dead is preferable to getting back up and into the fight, no doubt. But to kill him? I highly doubt that.

Essie tells us that Morontagh had thrown the fork from across the room. No, he shot it out of his ass-cheeks with a well-timed fart! Of course he threw it, you idiot! Anyway, back to the fight, and Sarros and the last thug now try to attack Morontagh. But he kicks a table into the thug’s belly and when the guy stumbles, Morontagh leaps on him and bashes his head into the floor. Sarros now turns tail to run and as he does, he throws some crystals at Morontagh. Morontagh uses the Word to make the crystals swerve and dive into the fireplace, which causes a minor explosion there. Before Sarros reaches the door, Morontagh catches up to him, grabs the back of the guy’s shirt and lifts him over his head before body-slamming him into the floor. This breaks Sarros’s arm. Essie’s mom tells her to stay behind her, and Essie tells the audience she wasn’t planning on doing anything other than just that. There are still a few guests in the tavern than edge away from Morontagh as he now steps on Sarros’s chest and demands to know where the guy found the rock. Essie’s dad makes his way to his family and he and his wife hug each other.

Suddenly we’re back with Sarros and Morontagh, and Sarros starts to laugh in a way that reminds Essie of the crazy guy who lives under the bridge nearby, and Sarros starts babbling about how Morontagh doesn’t know what he’s after, drops some hints about some big bad we don’t know anything about, calls him some names that don’t make any sense, and basically says we’re all just waiting to die. Morontagh ignores all these and demands information about the stone again. Sarros continues to babble about “the Dreamers” and he has a seizure that seems more like he took a cyanide pill to me than a legit seizure. While he’s seizing, he tells Morontagh he’s next, basically, and then he dies. Nobody moves for a while, but then Morontagh steals Sarros’s bird-skull amulet, gets his cloak, goes back to his unsurprisingly undisturbed table where he grabs the rock, his coins, and then stops to have a think. He then starts bouncing this pouch in his hand for no reason other than to look threatening, I guess, as he walks over to Essie and her parents.

“Please...,” said Papa. Essie had never heard him sound so desperate, and it gave her a sickening ache in her stomach. More than anything, his fear made her realize that the world was far scarier than she had originally thought. Their home had always felt like a safe place to Essie, but no longer. Neither her father nor her mother could protect her, not in the face of swords, and certainly not against magic. 

This thought, on one hand, bothers me. And the only reason it bothers me is because Essie is old enough to remember the horror of the war that just finished a YEAR AGO. Even if her parents shielded her from the worst of it, there’s no way that she didn’t see elves marching in the street, slinging magic everywhere and murdering innocent people (because you know they did. it’s canon. even though it was done off screen and probably in the forest, Islanzadi still murdered innocent humans as an “example” to the rest of the people living in Ceunon. Although if she murdered them as an “example” then it would’ve had to have been done in front of the whole town, otherwise the example kind of fails.) if the people defy them in some way. I mean, the elves occupied Ceunon for most of the story, if only because they don’t show up until the final battle in the last book. So what are they doing? Faffing about their superiority over humans who only know of them because of stories and myths? Of course, nobody finds anything wrong with this. Nobody finds anything the “good guys” do as wrong and morally corrupt. Essie should have come to this realization long before this tavern brawl that left behind a bunch of bodies that seem to just dissipate at the end of combat like in an RPG and destruction that seemed all so needless. She should have realized that nobody can protect her against anything and that running away into that world is a very bad idea.

It also bothers me because Essie doesn’t have the idea of “maybe I’ll start learning swords so I can protect myself”. She doesn’t think about doing anything to make it so that, if she faced this situation again, she could defend herself and her family. Sure, there’s nothing she could do against magic, but she did point out that nobody is supposed to use magic without the Queen’s permission, and if they do, well, we all know what happens. But that doesn’t mean Essie couldn’t protect herself. She should learn how to defend herself. It’s also interesting that, in a strange way, there’s kind of a hidden parallel between what just happened and Essie’s situation with Hjordis. Murtagh could’ve given in at any time to protect her. He could’ve turned over all his coin and hoped that Sarros would just go away. Much like Hjordis telling Essie if she didn’t push Carth into the trough she’d tell her dad not to drink at Essie’s family tavern, Sarros demanded Murtagh’s money and said if he didn’t get it, he’d get frisky. Murtagh could’ve folded and did what Sarros demanded. He didn’t, accepting the consequences for what might happen. Essie doesn’t make the connection between her situation and the one she was just involved in, and I think of course not, because that’s a little too deep for the author.

And course, the all-important take away is that Essie IS NOT ACTING LIKE A MENTALLY OR EMOTIONALLY HEALTHY LITTLE GIRL. She is acting completely detached from the moment, telling us about how scared she is, but she isn’t acting like it, hiding behind her mother notwithstanding. She isn’t crying from her near death experience, she isn’t really bothering to deal with her father except for that one token instance, she isn’t doing anything except analyzing the situation and deciding it’s not advantageous for her to do what she was planning to do, mostly because her safety isn’t guaranteed. I mean, look at what she says. Nobody can protect her, she says, but she isn’t thinking about how helpless her parents were. Or, that her mother literally put herself between Essie and danger. Her mother was making herself a literal shield to protect her daughter. But Essie doesn’t see that. It’s all about Essie, and what she perceives. 

Morontagh apologizes for the trouble and we’re randomly told he stinks because he’s sweaty and he’s splattered with blood. But he seems calm, and that’s all that matters. Why does a LITTLE GIRL notice this stuff? Anyway, he gives the coin to Essie’s dad and says that should make up for him making a mess of their tavern. Essie’s dad hesitates, but ultimately takes the money. Then this happens:

Papa licked his lips. “The Watch will be here any minute. If you leave out the back...you can make it to the gate before they see you.” 

There’s no way that “the Watch will be here any minute” because nobody left the tavern to go fetch them or raise the alarm. Unless he’s just saying this to get Murtagh out the door, then fine. Because people often say the popo are on their way when they’re really not just to get the possible criminal party to go away. Honestly, Murtagh not skipping out and leaving corpses behind him and staying to explain this was all self-defense would be slightly better than him dipping. Now he’s just a murderer, and anyone can say that these dead guys were just minding their own business when some weirdo with a fork came in and started killing them apropos of nothing. But of course, seeing as this is a Paolini-authored story, of course none of that happens and this is ask very conveniently forgotten about. No investigation, no manhunt, no Wanted posters, nothing. The NPC’s vanish and we move on.

Morontagh nods, then kneels down and yanks the fork out of the dead guy’s head. Essie retreats when he looks at her. He tells her that sometimes, you have to stand and fight. Running away isn’t always an option. Does she understand? Essie replies:

“Yes,” Essie whispered. 

I really don’t know why Murtagh equates this merciless killing with a spat between two little girls. Sure, Essie should stand her ground and not give Hjordis the ammunition with which to bully her, but Essie’s also kind of dug her grave at the moment, so to speak. She didn’t apologize to Carth after she pushed him; she got upset that Hjordis and her friends were laughing at her and she ran off. Even in the new book, Essie still doesn’t apologize to her supposed friend. I would like to redirect you to my little spitefic - Essie will never apologize to Carth for what she did, because in her mind, she’s not the one at fault. She’s the victim, not him. Hjordis should be the one to apologize, not Essie, who only did the action because of Hjordis’s lie. Murtagh’s not wrong, but Essie doesn’t understand him at all. What she just witnessed wasn’t Murtagh saving her life; it was him killing Sarros because Sarros was a greedy bastard. And Paolini wanted a tavern brawl instead of a stick-up in an alleyway, which is what Sarros would have done, in my opinion. He doesn’t know this guy from Adam, and probably thought Murtagh was just some rich guy throwing his weight around in gold. Most people like Sarros don’t enter into a confrontation unless they know they can win, and usually with conditions that suit them. And a fight in an alley would be much more suitable for Sarros because nobody would look twice or try get involved. The fact that Murtagh chose the tavern should have told Sarros that there was possible backup, that he could be entering a pitched situation if he chose that moment to tip his hand and demand all of the gold, and not just what he was owed. But no. Let’s do this the most stupid way possible because it’s easier for you. Honestly, I would have rather Sarros follow Murtagh into an alley or out of town and ambush him there. A) nobody would be around to question the bodies left behind and B) Thorn could be involved. But that would be interesting and I think Paolini has an allergy to “interesting”.

But back on to the topic - these two situations couldn’t be farther from each other. Sure, the message is basically “don’t take nobody’s shit and stand up for yourself”, but Essie only sees the solution to her problem as being physical violence toward another human being. Essie doesn’t go “the next time Hjordis tells me to do something or else, I tell her to shove it”. She goes “I’m going to stab her! Then she’ll leave me alone! And my friend will be my friend again!” Maybe in Paolini World this is a thing, but in the real world, which is what this is supposed to mirror, Essie would never be friends with Carth again because she never apologized to him for what she did, and then she’d probably also be brought up on charges of attempted murder when she tries to stab Hjordis, who (since she lives by the castle) has more social clout than Essie does. Essie doesn’t realize that her situation doesn’t warrant violence against Hjordis - her situation requires that she tell Hjordis to leave her the fuck alone and if she doesn’t, then she’ll go through the proper legal channels for a suit of harassment. It doesn’t matter what their social status is at that point, or what Hjordis threatens Essie with. Essie would have the strength to tell Hjordis off without having to stick a fork in her.

Morontagh then turns his attention to Essie’s parents. He asks them if they need the mason’s guild to stay afloat. Essie’s dad gets all confused and says no, they don’t, and then asks why. Then this happens:

“That’s what I thought,” said Tornac. Then he presented Essie with the fork. It looked perfectly clean, without so much as a drop of blood on it. “I’m giving this to you. It has a spell on it to keep it from breaking. If Hjordis bothers you again, give her a good poke, and she’ll leave you alone.” 

Actually, with Hjordis’s social standing, Essie would probably be brought up on attempted murder charges, because Hjordis’s father HAS A SEAT NEXT TO THE LORD OF CEUNON. And Essie’s parents can’t really afford to pay her fines or get her out of prison or prevent her from being executed. I also don’t understand why Murtagh does this. This seems so completely out of character for him to just present this child with a fork and then tell her to physically assault another person. Murtagh never acted like that in the previous books. Sure, he killed that slaver guy with the stupid name, but that was practical and it had everything to do with his own safety. This doesn’t. This is like giving the Big Red Button to a toddler and telling them not to push it before walking away and ignoring them for the rest of eternity.

Murtagh,

“Yes, Thorn?”

That girl you gave that fork to. Do you remember?

Murtagh paused and scanned through his memories, trying to find the one his friend spoke of. “I think so, why?”

Thorn pointed at a Wanted poster that hung on the message board that stood alone at the crossroads. Murtagh stepped closer to take a better look and stared. The piece of paper bore the face of Essie Siglingsdaughter, an exact likeness wrought by magic. There would be no mistaking her for anyone else. The girl’s face was twisted in a sneer, her eyes cold and lifeless.

“Wanted for attempted murder,” Murtagh read, not liking how his voice shook, “and is armed with a fork.” He inhaled sharply. “What happened…?”

You told her to poke that other girl. Thorn said. I guess the poke was more than a poke.

Or whatever. This is incredibly irresponsible on Murtagh’s part. I can understand him having empathy for Essie because of his past, where he was picked on and bullied for whatever reason. But the thing is, is he going to go around giving magic forks to all the bullied kids in Alagaesia? Is he going to go around trying to protect all the kids who get bullied every day all over the world? Because he’s basically given the gun to the bullied kid and told her to go take her revenge on her bully. And based on Essie’s behavior, you can’t tell me that she isn’t going to do exactly that and be happy about it. He didn’t teach her anything other than power equals victory. He didn’t teach her to stand up for herself with words and do it by the law - he taught her to stand up for herself by PHYSICALLY ASSAULTING someone. This bothers me so much, and I just want to reach through the page and slap the lot of them for being so enabling and stupid.

Essie’s mom says her name in that “I’m warning you” tone, but Essie ignores her. She says Morontagh is right. She can’t run away. But that’s not her only reason. She says her home is safer than elsewhere in the world, but she can’t rely on her parents to protect her. The fight she was just a witness to proved that. And to that I say, excuse me? Your MOTHER LITERALLY MADE HERSELF A MEAT SHIELD FOR YOU. Your mother was ready and willing to DIE FOR YOU when that thug came at the two of you with a fucking sword! And you’re telling me that you didn’t pick up on that? You didn’t see that moment of self-sacrifice your mother was willing to do for you? What an ungrateful little sack of shite! Ultimately what Essie takes away from this is that she has to learn how to defend herself and her family, all the while ignoring how her father tried to come to her rescue but didn’t because he got sucker-punched and how her mother was ready to die to protect her. So she takes the stupid fork and thanks Morontagh. Morontagh continues to be a, well, moron, and tells her that “all good weapons deserve a name”, especially the magical ones. He wants to know what she’s going to call this one. Then, without any self-awareness at all, without any remorse, without anything, Essie takes a LITERAL SECOND to think before she proudly states the fork is “Mister Stabby”.

What. The. Holy. Nine. Hells.

Instead of being disturbed like I am that he basically just gave a psychopath a murder weapon, Morontagh just smiles and laughs like she’s the cutest thing ever and says Mister Stabby is a good name and he likes it, and he hopes the fork brings her good fortune. Because this is not Murtagh. This is MORONTAGH.

And Essie smiled as well. The world was big and scary, but now she had a magical weapon. Now she had Mister Stabby! Maybe if she did poke Hjordis, Carth would forgive her. Essie could just see the expression of outrage on Hjordis’s face.... 

No, Carth would not forgive you. He would (and should, if this was anything like the real world) think you’re a crazy monster who now has a weapon to use against anyone you don’t like. My spitefic went into that a little bit, with Carth thinking he might be next if he said or did the wrong thing and Essie decided to go after him with the fork. Essie has never once thought that Carth would forgive her if she just apologized. She has never considered apologizing to him for what she did. Her first thought is “If I stab this girl, he’ll like me again!” Do you know how terrifying that is? That is a sociopath! That is the thought of a mentally unstable person! Essie is also only around ten years old. She doesn’t know how to control her physical strength, nor does she seem like the king of person who wants to. Especially against Hjordis. Essie seems to think that she and Hjordis are equals, but they’re not. Not really. It won’t be outrage on Hjordis’s face when Essie stabs her with the fork - it’s going to be fear. Terror. And that’s if Essie doesn’t stab her hard enough to do some serious injury or kill her outright. If Essie stabs her in a highly vulnerable spot, like her face or throat, she could kill Hjordis. If Essie stabs her in the stomach or chest, she could kill Hjordis. And I personally don’t think Essie would stop at one “poke”. I really think Essie would just keep “poking” Hjordis until the girl resembled a Rorschach test. I’m not sure why Essie would think Hjordis would become “enraged” when she sees Essie coming toward her with a fucking fork. At that point, it ceases being an implement to eat with and now is a weapon. Hjordis would be in very real danger, and if this story wasn’t so Sue-centric, then Hjordis would have Essie arrested. Not only that, if Essie succeeded in “poking” Hjordis, then there’s a very real chance that Essie would be executed because they are in two different social classes. This disturbs me so much that Paolini thinks this is okay. That this is right and just and good and that performing violence against someone who wronged you is something that should be lauded. That if you hurt someone, the person you hurt will suddenly forgive you for your trespass.

I really hope I’m just reading too much into the text and spitting out wild ideas that aren’t true, because if they are true… then I’m afraid for the kids who will be around his kids.

Her mother asks who Morontagh really is, and he says he’s “just another person looking for answers” which is a load of bullshite because I read enough in the new book to know he went looking for trouble instead of just going to build that castle he said he was going to build while he and Thorn worked through their trauma. Anyway, Essie says she thinks he’s going to leave right then, but then he suddenly puts a hand on her arm.

What is it with these men putting their hands on other people without permission?!

Anyway, he starts talking these words she doesn’t understand and she feels like he’s “plucked a string attached to her bones”. Essie has zero reaction to any of this. Her father, however, tells Morontagh to shove off and leave his daughter alone, but Morontagh’s already leaving at this point. As soon as he’s gone, her parents start running their hands over her to make sure she’s not hurt, and her mother even asks her if she’s hurt, what did the mean old man do to you, and Essie interrupts her to say she’s okay before promptly screaming as “a burning, tingling feeling swept through her left arm”. She likens this to the kind of pain one would feel if a hundred ants were nibbling on her. She grabs her sleeve, pulls it back aaaannnnd...

—the top of her forearm crawling with a life of its own as the long, puckered scar smoothed over and began to fade into normal, healthy skin. The scar shrank and shrank, until only a small red S-shape was left. But it didn’t vanish entirely: a remembrance of past pain. Of survival. 

Oh, please. You can’t expect me to believe that Essie will remember anything about why she got that scar. She doesn’t even take responsibility for it now when it wasn’t this small so as to be forgotten. Now this scar is easily forgotten, easily hidden, and Essie won’t look at it and remember how not listening to her parents and doing what she wants could get her hurt or even killed; she’ll just look at herself now and think how beautiful she is, and that nobody can torment her about it anymore, and she can proudly declare that she isn’t defective in some way because she’s suddenly not ugly anymore. This bothers me on so many levels, the least of which that Murtagh touched this child without her permission, performed body modification without her permission, and didn’t explain anything to her while he was doing it. For all Essie and her parents knew, this stranger just caused her to have an epileptic fit or caused her arm to fall off. They didn’t know he was going to remove that scar and make it like it never happened. Worse, he doesn’t stick around to make sure Essie knows why he did such a thing. He runs away like a little bitch. Another bother is that this is so out of character for Murtagh. He’s never done this before, and it doesn’t make sense to me that he would do so now. It also doesn’t make sense to me that, if he has this power, why he didn’t remove his own scar. Or why, in the big book, he doesn’t alter his appearance in any way to hide his identity. Finally, the fact that Essie is rewarded twice for her bad behavior bothers the shit out of me. She has learned nothing. She hasn’t learned to stand up for herself by using her words. She chooses violence. She has learned that her parents can’t protect her - but only because Murtagh was stupid and Sarros was stupid. She learned that running away isn’t always the answer, but stabbing someone to death with a fork will make your friends like you again. She has to get stronger to protect herself and her family, but her strength comes from a fork and violence and not her training herself and learning how to diffuse situations with her words or relying on her own strength to tell off someone who’s threatening her with “if you don’t do what I say, I’m going to tell my daddy not to spend money at your family’s inn”. Because, remember, that is what Hjordis threatened Essie with. Not physical violence. Not anything that deserves a stabbing via fork. But that’s how Essie is going to respond to Hjordis. Provoked or unprovoked, I don’t know, but I’m guessing that the next time two see each other, Hjordis is going to have a new scar that nobody is going to magically remove, so she’ll have to live with that terrifying memory for the rest of her life.

Essie can’t believe her scar is really gone. She touches the spot, then looks at her parents and starts bawling her eyes out, not because she’s so upset at having her body modified against her will, but because her scar is gone and she’s not ugly anymore! Her father says her name, her mother hugs her, and we jump outside to Morontagh. He stops to take a breath of air and talk about snow falling, and how everything is so quiet. Then, we get this:

His heart was pounding; it had yet to slow after the fight in the tavern. Stupid. He should have realized that spending so much gold might cause a problem. It wasn’t a mistake he would make again. 

Seriously, this can’t be Murtagh. It has to be Morontagh, because the Murtagh I know wouldn’t have done any of this. He wouldn’t have been so stupid as to flash around money like he’s Seto Kaiba trying to buy the Blue Eyes White Dragon from an old man who already told him no. Murtagh didn’t do any of this in the first book when he was on the lam. He didn’t try to draw attention to himself at all. And after that, it still felt like he was trying to stay on the down low. But now? Now it’s like he’s been lobotomized. He’s still not officially a Sue (I hesitate to describe him that way only because this isn’t his own brick of a book) but it’s like he’s been dumbed down to try to make Eragon look smarter and cooler by default. But this is the first mistake in a long line of mistakes that he makes and then tells himself he should’ve been more careful. Yeah. You should have. But since you’re currently under character assassination, you’ll keep making them until we have to separate you from your previous incarnation so we don’t want to throw the book in an incinerator and pretend that the real you is kicking it on a beach somewhere in an Italian Speedo having an adult beverage with one of those tiny umbrellas in it.

He wonders how long it’s been since he last killed somebody and then immediately tells us it was over a year ago. Which means, yet again, timeline is all screwy wonky, but whatever. He describes that a pair of bandits jumped him while he was heading back to camp one night, and he disparages the dead by calling them “foolish, uneducated louts”, which is something I would expect to hear out of Eragon’s mouth, and says he fought back “out of reflex”. By the time he realized what was happening, it was already too late. You know. As usual. Morontagh specifically describes remembering the sounds that “the one kid” makes as he dies, so I guess Eragon is no longer alone as a child-murderer. Morontagh then whines about how some people go their entire lives without killing and he wonders what that’s like. He gets prissy when a drop of blood runs down the back of his hand, and he scrapes his hand against the side of a building, getting a bunch of splinters that will never be heard from again.

He then goes from that to talking about how Sarros didn’t give him a location, but he knows the place exists thanks to that guy. He says he would have preferred disappointment in that arena. He doesn’t think that whatever is hiding there is good, and then he wonders about these Dreamers Sarros blathered on about, and whines about there being more mysteries. Yeah. Mysteries you actively seek out instead of just taking a nice long fishing trip or finding a tropical island and partaking in the local tour of wineries.

Finally, finally, we’re reminded that Thorn does indeed exist, because “a questioning thought” comes to Morontagh from somewhere outside of Ceunon, and Morontagh tells Thorn he’s fine. There was just a tiny delay. Thorn wonders if he needs to come, but he’s told no, stay put for now. After that, Thorn just disappears out of the story again, and Morontagh talks about how they’re connected and they’re so close and whatever. He finally starts to leave because he doesn’t want to be nabbed by the popo and then he stops because he sees something out of the corner of his eye. Guess what it is. No, guess. I’ll wait. We’ve seen it before. In Book Three. Arya made it. If you guessed “Arya’s grass ship”, you’d be right! He describes it, we really don’t care, and then the ship fucks out of this story. However, the sight of it makes Morontagh smile and talk about how he doesn’t know who made it but it really makes him happy. He then thinks back to what he told Essie, and decides maybe he should take his own advice. Maybe he should stop running - not that he’s “running” in the true sense of the word. he’s supposed to be healing - and go back to old friends. What old friends, I ask? Because the people he’s talking about were never his friends.

The prospect filled Murtagh with a mess of conflicting emotions. Wherever he’d gone, he had heard the venom in people’s voices when they spoke his name. No matter how vigorously Eragon or Nasuada might defend him in public, few there were who would trust him after his actions in service to Galbatorix. It was a bitter, unfair truth—one that circumstances had long ago forced him to accept. 

I have never seen any indication of Eragon or Nasuada doing what Murtagh has said. I’ve never seen them declare that none of what he did was his fault. I think there was like a token sentence of Eragon trying to clear Murtagh’s name like one time at the end of Book Four, but then it became too difficult so he stopped. There wasn’t anything from Nasuada. She used him, led him on, and somehow we’re supposed to believe that they’re in love but can’t be together because circumstances won’t allow it. Also, I’m pretty sure everyone in the Empire would love to have Murtagh around because he was actually helping them during the war, protecting them and whatnot, but the author would have us believe otherwise. From my perspective, the only people who cursed Murtagh’s name were Eragon, Nasuada, and everyone associated with them. I don’t remember anyone on the Empire’s side dissing Murtagh as much the Varden dissed him. In fact, I think he was preferred over Eragon, and of course, the author can’t have that. Also, Eragon is no longer in Alagaesia so he can’t be defending Murtagh in public. This is supposed to have have happened long after Eragon left, so I have no idea what Murtagh is talking about or why. As for Nasuada, she’d only try to defend him if it suited her purposes. This is such bullshit and a flat out lie from the hands of the author. None of this happened, but we’re supposed to believe it did.

Because of it, he had hidden his face, changed his name, and kept to the fringes of settled land, never walking where others might know him. And while the time alone had done both him and Thorn good, it was no way to live the rest of their lives. So again he wondered if perhaps the time had come to turn and face his past. 

He grew a fucking beard and picked the name of the dead guy he was associated with the most. Also, WHERE IS THE FUCKING HORSE. Although I guess Murtagh doesn’t need the horse since he has Thorn, but that horse was a sentimental horse because Tornac the human picked the horse for Murtagh, and Murtagh named the horse after the guy who taught him so much he was like a father to him. But the horse just fucking disappears after the first book and we don’t talk about it anymore. Now, I understand Murtagh’s need to be alone. He said it at the end of Book Four - he needed time to work through all the bad shit that happened to him and Thorn, and they needed to come to grips with the facts and then figure out how to rebuild their lives from there. They needed therapy. Murtagh was supposed to go somewhere and build a castle. Instead, he starts sticking his nose where it doesn’t belong because he doesn’t want to be anyone’s puppet again. Which is the exact opposite of what he ought to be doing if he’s trying to live quietly. And facing one’s past doesn’t mean running full tilt at the next thing that’s going to try to kill you or returning to an old flame and getting suckered into being their puppet. It’s about reflecting on the things that happened to you, learning if you can live with those scars, seeing if you can learn anything from those events, and growing as a person so that you aren’t surprised by those shenanigans ever again. Facing your past is making peace with the dead king who abused and used you, with your dead father who abused you, with your dead mother who never seemed to give two shits about you, and dealing with those facts and overcoming them. To decide you’re not going to let that crap rule your life and the way you operate and do things. To decide you would never treat anyone the way you were treated. But no. Having that kind of self-reflection would be interesting and Paolini hates interesting.

Of course, before he decides to do anything of that nature, he looks at the bird-skull amulet he yoinked off Sarros’s neck and wonders about it, because it’s got an enchantment on it that can foil the Name of Names, the end all be all magic that supposedly can do anything and everything. He blah blahs on about wordless magic and whatever, we don’t care, it’s dangerous right, and he decides to focus on this Bachel lady and figure out who she is and what she’s doing and make her give him those answers. He decides those answers will be very interesting. Which means he’s going to stick his nose where he shouldn’t stick it, all based on the flimsy excuse of “if I don’t get them first, they’ll get me”.

And that is where this short story ends. And before you ask, yes, all of this is basically copy/pasted right into the newest brick, but this time it’s from Morontagh’s point of view rather than Essie’s. Nothing else remotely changes save for that. Which makes it extremely annoying, because you realize you may have paid twice for the same content, if you bought this book and Murtagh.