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Chapter Four | Table of ContentsChapter Five (Part II)


(Kerlois walks in)

Kerlois: Good day, everyone. I will be doing chapter five on my own, so here will be my attempt at giving commentary.

Last time, Saphira hatched. In this chapter, we will see her grow and develop during the first month of her life. Eragon also becomes a Rider.





Chapter Five: Awakening

I do not know what the title refers to, exactly. My best guess is that it references Saphira, as she has just awoken from the slumber she experienced in her egg, but a) she awoke last chapter, and b) this chapter will cover over a month of her growth. It might also refer to some metaphorical “awakening” of the bond between Eragon and Saphira… Well, I have no idea.

The chapter begins like this:

The dragon was no longer than his forearm, yet it was dignified and noble. Its scales were deep sapphire blue, the same color as the stone. But not a stone, he realized, an egg. The dragon fanned its wings; they were what had made it appear so contorted. The wings were several times longer than its body and ribbed with thin fingers of bone that extended from the wing’s front edge, forming a line of widely spaced talons. The dragon’s head was roughly triangular. Two diminutive white fangs curved down out of its upper jaw. They looked very sharp. Its claws were also white, like polished ivory, and slightly serrated on the inside curve. A line of small spikes ran down the creature’s spine from the base of its head to the tip of its tail. A hollow where its neck and shoulders joined created a larger-than-normal gap between the spikes.

The description is not bad in and of itself, but I do have some notes to make:

-It is severely disjointed. While there are no sentence fragments, many of the sentences could easily have been linked by either using “and” or a semicolon. It might not change much in the way of wording, but it would make this much easier to read. Here goes a count, then…?

PPP: 93

-It is good to see that Eragon has recognised that the “stone” is, in fact, an egg. There only needed to be sixty Dead Herrings to keep the mystery. And what for? The twist is quite obvious from the cover. The only thing it achieves is to make Eragon look foolish. I will give it this, because of its sheer uselessness:

PPP: 103

-The “fingers of bone” in Saphira’s wing form talons? This will never come up again. I think it might be a thing young dragons have in this setting; then the reason we do not hear about this later would be that we mostly skip over Saphira’s development, and that we do not see any young dragons aside from her. Still, clarity would be nice.

PPP: 104

-Why does Eragon compare the colour of her claws to “polished ivory”? I can excuse it by saying he has seen ivory on an occasion that the traders came along, which is entirely possible, considering that there is ivory in this world. Still, this could have been handled better. As for the question of where the ivory can come from… someone other than me will think on that.

PPP: 105

Well, Eragon shifts slightly, which immediately draws Saphira’s attention, and she looks at him with “[h]ard, ice-blue eyes.” Eragon wisely keeps still, because “[i]t might be a formidable enemy if it decide[s] to attack.” Eminently reasonable. Saphira might not look like much, but Eragon does not know yet what kind of abilities she has, and caution is certainly a good thing in that case.

Saphira loses interest in Eragon and begins exploring the room, “squealing as it bump[s] into a wall or furniture.” I… am of two minds about this. On the one hand, I understand that Eragon does not want to come close to Saphira until/unless he is sure it is safe. On the other hand, why does he let Saphira do this? He could at least try to call out to her, and make her come to the bed or the like. This seems a bit callous. Also, why do Garrow or Roran not hear any of this?

Anyway, Saphira flutters onto the bed and crawls to his pillow (he had one?), while squeaking. Awwwww, she is so cute here! What a pity it will not last. Saphira’s mouth is open “pitifully, like a young bird’s, displaying rows of pointed teeth.” Huh. I do not remember her having several rows… Oh, this will also be referenced in chapter 11, and in chapter 2 of Brisingr. Still, I would have liked it if this would be explained in somewhat greater detail. My best guess is that the teeth other than the front row are “replacement teeth”. That would fit in with a line from Inheritance that suggests that losing teeth is no big deal for Saphira, and it would help put something else from Brisingr in perspective… We will get there when we get there, though. For now…

Manual Patch Job: 7 (my rename of “the story behind the story”)

Eragon goes to sit “cautiously” on the end of the bed. This line follows: “The dragon smelled his hand, nibbled his sleeve.”

-I spot a comma splice. I mainly point this out because they are not very common in this series, and they also do not fit the rather formal tone it has.

PPP: 106

-How does Saphira smell his hand? I ask this because the series is not very clear on how the dragons smell, exactly. At some times, the dragons “smell” like most reptiles do, by sticking out their tongue to sample the air, and then presumably using their vomeronasal organ to do the actual “smelling”. Like here:

The stew simmered quietly, spreading a rich aroma through the clearing. The tip of Saphira’s tongue snaked out and tasted the air. ~Eragon, Chapter 14, “A Rider’s Blade”

But sometimes, they also seem to smell using only their nose, like here:

Eragon! cried Saphira. She forced her head and shoulders into the vestibule and nosed open the door to the closet, flaring her nostrils at the scent of blood. ~Eldest, Chapter 33, “The Secret Lives of Ants”.

My solution would be that the can use the two modes of smelling interchangeably, with smelling with their nose being used for general scents, and smelling with their tongue being used for more precise investigation. We will have to see how this will hold up.

Manual Patch Job: 8

-“Nibble” is a quite inappropriate word here, mainly because I cannot see how Saphira can nibble on anything. If she takes a bite, she will have to tear, because of the way her teeth are, and that precludes nibbling. What shall I give it…

That’s Not How Any of This Works: 22

It does make for a nice jokey addition to my vocabulary.

-Eragon is being a bit incautious here. He could at least have tried to sit further away from Saphira, and not take the risk of her touching him.

Eragon, apparently seeing caution, pulls his arm back out of biting range. And here I want to discuss another issue. It might not be the best place, but as Scales did not cover this in the previous chapter, this is as good a place as any.

How long ago did Eragon get Saphira’s egg? If we assume that the day she hatches is November 2, and the day Eragon found her in the Spine was October 8, then it’s been 25 days since he has found her. To explain why this is relevant, I will give some more backstory. As we will find out, dragons like Saphira, who are destined to be bonded with a Rider, cannot hatch until they meet a Rider who is fit for them. We are also told that people used to line up to touch a dragon egg, in the hope that they would be bonded. That strongly implies to me that the dragon would hatch quite fast after being touched by the future Rider.

So why did Saphira only hatch after 25 days, and not right away in the Spine? For the latter, I suspect it is because Saphira does not like Eragon that much, which will become very clear later on. For the former… I suspect Umaroth. Though we are not explicitly told so, I am quite certain he has more than enough power and knowledge to make Saphira hatch. It would also fit in with his aims, because keeping Saphira out of hands of Galbatorix is quite important to him.

Look Away: 66

Manual Patch Job: 9

The “Look Away” point is for making her hatch when she does not want to… not that it is very bad in and of itself, because she should not have had to wait in her egg for so long to begin with. As for the rest… I think this is better postponed to chapter 16. Corneille Noire will have much to say then…

Back to the story. Eragon smiles as he looks at Saphira. He “[t]entatively” reaches out with his right hand and “touche[s] its flank”. That seems quite incautious. He could at least try to touch Saphira with a finger first; after all, better to lose a finger than a hand. And if he is to touch her, it might as well be on her back, where she cannot reach him quite as easily.

Regardless, Eragon touches her flank. Immediately, a “blast of icy energy” surges into his hand and races into his arm, “burning in his veins like liquid fire”. Well, that escalated quickly. He falls back and gives a “wild cry”. “An iron clang” fills his ears, and he hears “a soundless scream of rage.” Um… what happened here? Eragon has experienced some kind of sensory overload because he has touched Saphira, it seems, but “a soundless scream of rage”?? Where could that possibly come from? We never find out, and it will never come up again.

Straight From Left Field: 17

“Every part of his body sear[s] with pain”, we are told. Eragon struggles to move, but is unable to. I must say that this sounds quite terrifying. After “what seem[s] like hours”, the cold begins to disappear, leaving a “tingling” behind. He manages to sit upright, “shivering uncontrollably.” His hand is numb and his fingers are paralysed. “Alarmed”, he watches while a “diffuse white oval” forms on his palm. We are told that the skin “itche[s] and burn[s] like a spider bite.” Eragon’s heart pounds frantically.

I have some thoughts on this. First of all, the scene is quite awfully written. The prose is very bland, and we get no actual sense of what Eragon feels. There is no actual sense of how scary something like this would be; we do not get to see Eragon’s thoughts as he lies paralysed or how disconcerted he is to see an oval appear on his hand. I mean, I can see that it is awful and I can empathise somewhat, but that is not because this scene was so well-written.

PPP: 107

Second, we will never get an explanation of what exactly happened here, or why this still occurs after the Riders have had 2600 years to smooth out the kinks in the bonding system!

Missing Puzzle Pieces: 93

Seriously, why is this this pain and paralysis necessary? It is not just Eragon, either; in Inheritance, we will hear from someone else who has had this same experience, and given that we never hear anything more specific about this, it seems fair to me to extrapolate this to the Riders in general. It just seems quite inconvenient and awful to put prospective Riders through this, and we never find out why.

Thirdly, I see that Eragon barely reacts to this. Sure, we see his physical reaction, in that his heart is pounding, but we do not see any kind of emotional reaction, and after this, he will completely brush it aside.

Reaction, Please: 26

This also weakens the impact of what has happened here. Instead of being treated like a serious experience, it is treated more like a minor inconvenience. I do not exactly like this decision; something like this should not be brushed off this lightly.

Look Away: 67 (for lack of a better count)

Another thing that I would wish would not be brushed away nearly this lightly is the mark on Eragon’s palm. Oh, it does come up later often enough, and Eragon even gets a nickname based on it, but he is not disconcerted by being marked like this without agreeing to it.

Reaction, Please: 27

Look Away: 68

On with the story. Eragon blinks, “trying to understand what ha[s] occurred.” And that is all the reaction he is allowed to have. The story immediately skips to him feeling something brush over his consciousness, “like a finger trailing over his skin”. Hmm. I wish this series would have stuck to sensory comparisons for the telepathy part… He feels it again, but now it has become a “tendril of thought through which he [can] feel a growing curiosity.” ~Spoilers~. Yes, that is Saphira. She and Eragon now share a mental link. Eragon compares this to an “invisible wall” around his thoughts having fallen away, which leaves him free to “reach out” with his mind.

He is afraid that he will float away from his body if he does not have anything to hold him back, and that he will be unable to return, and “becom[e] a spirit of the ether.” This is a somewhat more appropriate reaction to have, though it is still understated.

Reaction, Please: 28

I am more interested, though, in the “spirit of the ether” part. This will also come up in chapter 22, so I do not think it is some weird turn of phrase. Other than that, though, we do not get any kind of background on this, which is a pity, as this could be good worldbuilding. From the sound of it, I guess that the belief goes that the “ether” is filled with ghosts/spirits, and that it’s possible to become one, as well as get them out of the ether (that detail is from chapter 22). That might make for a good idea for a fanfic…

Missing Puzzle Pieces: 94

Eragon gets scared and pulls away. At that, his sense vanishes “as if he ha[s] closed his eyes”. Nice simile, and it fits in with the way telepathic contact is described later on. Finally, Eragon “glare[s] suspiciously” at the “motionless dragon.” Well, good to see he has connected Saphira to the feeling, but does this really warrant a glare? Saphira has just hatched! She does not know what she is doing, after all.

Saphira, described as motionless just before, now bumps into Eragon, as a “scaly leg” scrapes against him. Eragon “jerk[s] back”, in what is an entirely appropriate reaction to this. I am amazed. This time, however, he does not receive a shock. Eragon gets “[p]uzzled”, and rubs Saphira’s head with his right hand. Good to see Eragon has thrown all caution to the wind, even though just before, he was still cautious.

PPP: 108 (for the inconsistent characterisation)

Rubbing her head produces a “light tingling” that runs up his arm, but nothing more. Saphira nuzzles him in response, “arching [her] back like a cat.” Cute. Eragon then slides a finger over her “thin wing membranes.” He compares the feel to “old parchment, velvety and warm, but still slightly damp.” She did just hatch, after all. I can also stand the comparison to parchment, because as we will see later, Brom probably has some of it lying around his house, and Eragon has been there before, so he can know what it feels like. Eragon describes the “hundreds of small veins” that lace through it.

Saphira again makes mental contact, but this time, Eragon feels “an overpowering, ravenous hunger” rather than curiosity. She did just crawl from her egg, after all, and she has never eaten before. Eragon gets up with a sigh. He tells us: “[t]his [is] a dangerous animal, of that he [is] sure.” Oh, and why is Saphira dangerous, exactly? Because she is hungry? Because she is a predator? Oh, she certainly can be dangerous, but so can other animals, like, to give an example, Birka and Brugh, and they are not classified as “dangerous animals”. It just irks me that Saphira is designated “dangerous” while she has done absolutely nothing to justify it; like her being a dragon makes her inherently dangerous.

Use ‘Em As You Will: 3

Still, Eragon thinks “[she] seem[s] so helpless crawling on his bed, he [can] only wonder if there [is] any harm in keeping it.” Well, in this case it turns out there is no harm in it, because Saphira is a bonded dragon and thus should be raised around humans/Urgals/elves/dwarves/the like. But if she had not been, which Eragon has no way of knowing, he might just mess her up for life. Not that he cares. I also note that he seems to want to “keep” Saphira merely because he thinks it will cause him no harm, rather than because he actually cares about her wellbeing.

Look Away: 69

Use ‘Em As You Will: 4

Saphira “wail[s] in a reedy tone” while she looks around for food. Eragon quickly scratches her head to shut her up. He decides that “[he’ll] think about this later”. Well, very convenient that he can just do that. He then leaves the room, carefully closing the door behind him.

Cut to Eragon returning with “two strips of dried meat” (where is that from…?), as he finds Saphira sitting on the window sill, looking at the moon. Oh, that is certainly a nice detail. All this must be quite overwhelming for her, after all. Eragon now cuts the meat into “small squares”, I presume with his knife. What happened to that, anyway? At the end of the last chapter, he was still holding it, but I presume he let go of it by the time he touched Saphira, and now he has retrieved it again? This book seems to lack any sense of object permanence, though this particular knife will make it all the way to Inheritance.

Anyway. Eragon gives one square to Saphira. She smells it cautiously, and then “jab[s] her head forward like a snake” and snatches it up, “swallowing it whole with a peculiar jerk.” She then prods his hand for more food. I do like this scene, I must say.

Eragon now feeds her, carefully keeping his fingers away. By the time there is only one square left, her belly “bulg[es]”. He offers the last piece. Saphira thinks about it for a moment, and then snaps it up too. Now she is done eating, she crawls onto his arm and curls up against his chest. She snorts, and “a puff of dark smoke” comes from her nostrils. It will be quite some time before she will breathe fire, though. Eragon “look[s] at [her] with wonder”, a sentiment that I can fully get behind. If only this series could make me feel wonder more often…

Just when Eragon thinks Saphira is asleep, she begins humming softly. Awww, she is so happy! He gently carries her to the bed and puts her near his pillow. Saphira then “contentedly” wraps her tail around his “bedpost”. So has bed has actual bedposts? I did not get that impression earlier… Also, what a cutie! Eragon goes to lie next to her, “flexing his hand in the near darkness.”

Because it is “later”, we now get two paragraphs of thoughts about Saphira. We are told that Eragon faces a “painful dilemma”. He says that “[b]y raising a dragon, he [can] become a Rider.” Hmm. This seems a somewhat strange idea to me. I could argue that going through the process of the Rider training would make one a dragon, but Eragon will also be named as a Rider in this very book, even though he has had none of that education. I would say that merely touching a dragon hatchling and undergoing the bonding would be enough to become a Rider, and that is indeed the definition that Brom will use some time later. I do not exactly see where Eragon’s definition would come into play…

Anyway. I think it is good to do the next portion line-by-line.

Myths and stories about Riders were treasured, and being one would automatically place him among those legends.

-I repeat what I said above. Eragon already is a Rider.

-Being a Rider will not “automatically” place him among the legends. If he and Saphira were to disappear at this moment, for instance, there would certainly be no legends about him. Even granted that he does indeed raise Saphira, he first has to become known to people. To be fair, once he becomes known, he would likely become a legend soon, be it only on account of him being the only new Rider in over a hundred years.

-I am not very glad that Eragon’s reason for raising Saphira seem to boil down to “I can become famous”. Granted, he abandons this thought quite soon, and he does not follow through on it, so I do not mind that much.

However, if the Empire discovered the dragon, he and his family would be put to death unless he joined the king.

This conclusion seems somewhat reasonable, especially if we take the “Empire = evil” stuff at face value, but it falls apart under scrutiny. Why would Galbatorix want to kill the new Rider, after all? Eragon and Saphira could make for good new servants, as the Forsworn and their dragons have died, and Durza is, well, not the most competent and also implied to be suicidal, as per Inheritance. And even if Galbatorix would only want Saphira, she would be more likely to cooperate if he did not have Eragon killed.

All in all, the best way for Galbatorix to get Eragon and Saphira on board would be to convince them to get on his side and then make them swear loyalty to him. So I would not expect Galbatorix to order the immediate execution of Eragon’s family. At worst, he might hold Eragon’s family hostage in order to blackmail him, but summarily executing them would be certain to turn Eragon against him. And all of this will also be repeated throughout the series, so I am not without proof.

No one could—or would—help them.

The em-dash is not needed here, and is frankly quite clunky. I also do not think that no one would stand with Eragon. After all, in Eldest, the greater part of Carvahall stands with Roran when the Empire comes to get him.

The simplest solution was just to kill the dragon, but the idea was repugnant, and he rejected it.

Well, good to see he does not want to kill her! I am still not very happy with this, though. Why does he even consider this? I would think that if he actually cared about her, he would not even think about this. And note that he decides not to kill her because it is “repugnant”, not because he values her life or because it is wrong. It feels more like a general thought of “I do not like killing” (without much conviction, I might add), and less like “I will not let Saphira come to harm”. You know what, here starts the count Hell-Bound Partners. This will go for all the times that the bond between Riders and dragons is far from perfect.

Hell-Bound Partners: 5

I also think I have located what I do not like about this. Eragon treats Saphira as some kind of special item, that he wants to have around and raise simply because he likes to, and to who he does not have any kind of special obligations. If he would treat Saphira as a being with needs and wants that need attending to, and if he would raise her because it is the right thing to do, I would like this much more.

Dragons were too revered for him to even consider that.

1) You literally just considered that.

2) If dragons are so revered, why do you treat Saphira like some kind of exotic pet?

3) This might fit in interestingly with later books… I will make sure that it is brought up there.

Besides, what could betray us? he thought. We live in a remote area and have done nothing to draw attention.

While that is true enough, there is still magic. Someone who has had the egg earlier might have scryed it, or might have used a spell to locate it. For all you know, they might be coming for you right now.

On to the next paragraph. Eragon says that the problem is “convincing Garrow and Roran to let him keep the dragon.” Obviously, neither of them would want a dragon around. Now we get a chunk of italicised thoughts. Eragon thinks he could raise it in secret, which I think is indeed the best option in this situation. It would be best if he would tell Roran and Garrow, but if they want to kill her, keeping her secret is imperative, of course.

Eragon says that “in a month or two” Saphira will be too large for Garrow to get rid of (she would sooner get rid of him then). How do you know that, Eragon? Maybe he bases this on the growth of other farm animals he has seen? Eragon wonders if Garrow will “accept” Saphira. The best way to find out, Eragon, is by asking him. Just try to ask it in hypothetical form, and from his reaction, you can see if it would be a good idea to tell. And do the same with Roran. Not that he will actually do any of this…

He says that even if Garrow would accept Saphira, he is unsure if he can get enough meat for Saphira while she is in hiding. Because, as he says, she is “no larger than a small cat”, but she has already eaten an “entire handful of meat”. Um, Eragon, you could go hunting. Okay, at this point, that might not work, but in the long term, it would arouse less suspicion from Roran and Garrow, and you would also have a good source of food for Saphira. There might not be deer or the like around the farm, but there should be more than enough wildlife to support a single young dragon.

Scales: If I might break in, I would like to introduce another count here.

Kerlois: Yes?

Scales: Then here goes Paoclichés. This will go for all the specific clichés in Paolini’s work, from overused similes to scenes from one book that are copied in another. (Hat tip to @highperformanceturtle and @tomhur for the inspiring count.)

Kerlois: And what instances do you introduce it for…?

Scales: For the two times Saphira has been compared to a cat thus far. I know it is tenuous now, but it will certainly get worse later on. Bye!

Kerlois: So we get this:

Paoclichés: 2

Eragon supposes that Saphira will be capable of hunting for herself eventually, but he wonders how long that will be. Well, given that Saphira can already walk around the room unaided, and is beginning to fly, I would not think very much longer. He then wonders if she will be able to survive the cold; a quite reasonable concern, given that Saphira is a reptile, and he could expect reptiles to be ectothermic and thus not take well to the cold. Dragons will prove to be a special case, though.

After this thought process, his next thought is: “All the same, he wanted the dragon.” Well, just refer back to what I said earlier. He just wants to have his exotic pet, dammit!

Hell-Bound Partners: 6

Look Away: 70

Use ‘Em As You Will: 5

He tells us that the more he thinks about it, the surer he becomes. He decides that however things may go with Garrow, he will do everything he can to protect Saphira. “Determined”, he falls asleep, with Saphira lying against him.

And this is the point where I first begin to actively dislike Eragon, for all the reasons I have set out above.

Anyway. Cut to dawn on November 2nd. Saphira “[is] sitting atop his bedpost, like an ancient sentinel welcoming the new day.” Would it have hurt to use a less confusing simile, Paolini? I also cannot visualise how Saphira is supposed to sit on the bedpost. If she is “as large as a small cat”, she would be much too large to fit on most bedposts, so I guess those on Eragon’s bed must be very large? I do not think Paolini thought this through.

Eragon “marvel[s]” at her colour, saying he has never seen “such a clear, hard blue.” While I do not that she looks beautiful, I do wonder why Eragon has never seen the colour of Saphira’s scales. I would think that he has seen such a colour in the sky often enough. He tells us that “[her] scales [are] like hundreds of small gemstones.” Like sapphires, then. Which is why she is called “Saphira”, after all.

He now notices that the “white oval” on his palm has a “silvery sheen”. Still not showing the least reaction to this, I see. Eragon hopes he can hide it by “keeping his hands dirty.” Well, good luck getting horrible infections, Eragon. It is not like you could put on gloves or the like. It is autumn going on winter, after all, so it will not be that conspicuous.

Saphira now “launche[s]” off the bedpost and glides to the floor. That is certainly quick! Eragon “gingerly” picks her up, and then grabs “meat, several leather strips, and as many rags as he [can] carry.” And then he just walks out with Saphira into the cold, which might kill her if she were not some other kind of reptile. He does not take a few minutes to let her acclimate to the cold and to gauge her reaction; instead, he blithely assumes she will be fine and it works out because she is an endotherm (something that Eragon cannot know).

Hell-Bound Partners: 7

Look Away: 71

We are told the “crisp morning” is beautiful, as a fresh layer of snow has fallen. He smiles as Saphira takes in the environment “from the safety of his arms.” Eragon now hurries across the fields and into the “dark forest”, where he searches for a safe place for Saphira. After some time, he finds a “rowan tree” that stands alone on a “barren knoll”, “its branches snow-tipped gray fingers that reached toward the sky.” Not that excessive qua prose, but could be better. Eragon sets Saphira down at the “base of the trunk” and shakes the leather onto the ground. Um, where was he carrying all this? Given that Saphira was just implied to be in his arms, I guess he might have stored this in his pack… It still would have been better to have been shown this, though.

PPP: 109

Saphira goes to investigate some “snowy clumps” around the tree. Meanwhile, Eragon sets to work. “With a few deft movements”, he makes a “noose” and slips it over Saphira’s head. And then he hangs her. I am not serious, of course, but I did get that image out of this. I think “leash” would work far better in this context. According to Eragon, the leather is worn, but it will still hold. He watches Saphira crawl around for a bit, and then unties the noose, and makes a “makeshift harness for [her] legs” so she will not strangle herself. Then what was the point of this, especially since the harness will never show up again, and Ergon will presumably get rid of it as she grows? I cannot see any at all.

Eragon now gathers “an armful of sticks”. Where did those come from? If he gathers them from the environment of the tree, would he not rather be gathering branches instead of “sticks”? This should be clearer.

PPP: 110

He climbs high into the tree and builds a “crude hut”, which he layers with rags, and in which he puts the meat. Some snow falls on his face while he is building. He hangs some more rags over the front “to keep heat inside.” Then Eragon, “pleased”, “survey[s]” the shelter. Well, that went fast. Good to see he bothered to give her a good shelter, too.

He says that it is time to show Saphira her “new home” (what was her old one, then? Her egg?), and he lifts her into the branches. She wriggles a bit as she tries to get free, and if she were a wild dragon, Eragon could probably never use his hands again. His utter lack of caution continues to baffle me. Saphira now climbs into the hut, takes some meat, and curls up. Then she “blink[s] coyly” at him. Ummm… Does Saphira want to seduce Eragon? Because from the definitions of “coy”, those meaning “shy” do not really fit with how Saphira has behaved until now, and this is also a definition:

“Pretending shyness or modesty, especially in an insincere or flirtatious way.”

I am fairly certain this is just a matter of poor word choice, but given how she will behave later on… it is more than a little uncomfortable.

Anyway. Eragon tells Saphira that she will be fine as long as she stays in there, she will be fine. Except if there will be another snow storm, of course. Saphira blinks again. A thought: if she is supposed to be so cat-like in behaviour, should Eragon not be blinking back to reassure her? Eragon is “[s]ure that [she] ha[s] not understood him”. So why did you talk to her first, then? Did you honestly expect her to understand you? Okay, to be fair, he might have guessed that dragons can understand verbal language, which will prove to indeed be the case for Saphira. But even then, she has only just hatched, and this is the first time anyone has spoken to her since then. How should she have already learned it, then? If he had tried this first on the off chance that it would work, I would have no problem with this, but as-is, I have no idea why he did this.

Regardless, Eragon goes to contact Saphira mentally: he “grope[s]” around with his mind until he feels her consciousness. He is again disturbed by the “feeling of openness—of a space so

large it presse[s] down on him like a heavy blanket.” He summons his strength, and focusses on Saphira, trying to “impress” on her the thought Stay here. Good thinks, Eragon. Saphira stops moving and “cock[s] [her] head” at him. He pushes the thought harder. He feels a “dim acknowledgement” coming from Saphira, but he wonders if she has really understood. As he thinks: After all, it’s only an animal.”

Well, how can I respond to this…

1) Eragon, by your own admission, you just got an acknowledgement from Saphira, so I think she has understood at least something, and I see no reason why she would fake this. Granted, it is only a “dim” acknowledgement, but keep in mind that Saphira is still a hatchling of less than a day old, and this is the first time that she is actually communicating telepathically.

2) Building on that, the instruction he gives is quite simple. Saphira might be a hatchling, but I think “stay in this place” is not that hard to grasp for her. Couple that with the acknowledgement Eragon felt, and I am quite certain she has actually understood this.

3) Saphira might be “only an animal”, but that does not mean that she cannot be communicated with. And Eragon should know that; he knows how to ride horses, and that also requires communication. Just because she is not a human does not, in and of itself, mean that communication will be difficult; it just means that communicating with her like with a human will probably not work.

4) As for the last line: I do not care if she is “only an animal”, she should still be treated with respect, which is not exactly how Eragon has interacted with her.

Use ‘Em As You Will: 7

He pulls back in relief and “[feels] the safety of his own mind envelop him.” He walks back to home, “casting glances backward”. Oh, you do not have to worry, Eragon; she will be perfectly fine. Saphira sticks her head out of the shelter and watches him go “with large eyes”. Awww, poor dragon.

Eragon hurries home and sneaks back into his room and gets rid of the remnants of the egg. I guess he throws the fragments out in the fields or the like, because the text does not say. Eragon is sure that Garrow and Roran will not notice that the egg is gone, because “it ha[s] faded from their thoughts after they [have] learned it [can] not be sold.” That seems very unlikely to me. I could certainly understand the possibility that they would have forgotten, but a) Eragon still had the egg around the house, which would make it harder to forget, and b) they only learned that a day and a half ago! That seems to me like a much too short timespan to forget about something that they were quite occupied with. Even if they had somewhat forgotten it, they should notice it is gone at some point. But, at no point in the next few months, do they ever do that. It frankly feels like a patch to me, to explain how Garrow and Roran do not notice that the egg is gone. An entirely unnecessary patch, at that, because Eragon might as well have said that he threw the stone in the Anora because it might be cursed, or something.

As-is, it seems like, in-universe, Umaroth made Roran and Garrow forget about the egg to prevent them from causing trouble. He will be shown to be the “invisible hand” behind a big part of the story, after all, so why should these tinier contrivances not be his doing?

Look Away: 72

Manual Patch Job: 10

When Roran and Garrow get up, Roran says he has heard “some noises during the night”, but, to Eragon’s relief, he “[does] not pursue the issue.”

Okay, I believe this even less. Granted, he can certainly have heard things I would describe as “some noises”: Eragon getting up and walking around with the egg, him going to fetch meat for the first time and Saphira crawling around. I can also grant that Roran and Garrow did not hear Saphira squeak. But it seems quite strange to me that neither of them heard Saphira’s egg drop to the ground. According to Eragon, that sound was quite loud, after all. To be fair, though, the sound might have woken Roran, and he might not have noticed because of that.

What I cannot account for in this way is Eragon crying out when he touched Saphira. That seems like something that Roran, at least, should have heard, especially since it was also the time that he would most likely have heard the noises. And that last part makes it so unbelievable to me. So Roran can hear Eragon and Saphira stumbling around, but he cannot hear Eragon scream? Not without outside intervention.

Look Away: 73

Manual Patch Job: 11

And with this, I think it is for the best to take a break. I am approximately halfway through the chapter, and already this write-up is more than twice as long as the chapter itself. I did not even give commentary on every single line, like Scales and I did in chapter 3. And because I like to keep this palatable, I would like to continue after a break of some time.

Scales: Well, good idea. Also, just to confirm, you have dropped the counts Evidence, Please and Land of Incompetents?

Kerlois: Indeed. They were getting hard to maintain and they did not serve a very important function, so I let them go.

Scales: Fair enough.

Kerlois: Next time, there will be a montage of Saphira’s further development, and she says her first word. What will it be? See you then!

Date: 2023-06-24 12:36 am (UTC)
From: (Anonymous)
It was largely in the description about Saphira being so hungry on hatching that she ate until the shapes of the meat pieces could be seen pressing outward. That happens with Pern's hatchlings.

= Multi-Facets.

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