A lot of people I've talked to seem to really not like Rudric for some reason. I mean, he didn't mean to kill Esben, it was an accident. And he had a perfectly legitimate reason to think that Nia, his fiance, was in danger. I mean, would it have been better if he'd seen this giant bear thing, which had been walloping Grey Fangs, getting very close to Nia, and he didn't do anything about it???
And another thing. There was nothing wrong with Rudric and Nia getting engaged!! As far as either of them knew, Esben was dead! And Nia seemed a lot happier with Rudric there. Like Kalmar said, he was like medicine for the pain of losing Esben. Someone (not on TTH) once said that they didn't like Rudric because they thought of him and Nia getting engaged as a bit of an unwanted interuption in the kids' lives, after everything they had been through. But I disagree. I highly doubt Nia would have thought of that as an interruption.
Rudric's death was one of my least favorite deaths in the series (I didn't have any favorite deaths, btw), mainly because that meant that he and Nia wouldn't get back together. 'Cause I think they would have, if he hadn't died. Rudric was a really nice guy, and I think Nia knew that he definitely hadn't meant to kill her husband. She was just still hurting for, well, all of book four, and seeing Rudric reminded her of that.
One of the reasons I liked Rudric was because he helped my favorite character feel happy again. Now, usually, I kinda like it when my favorite character has something tragic in their overall story. I'm weird like that. But in this instance, I really wanted something nice to happen for a change. Nia had a ridiculously hard time of it, what with losing Esben (twice), her mother, her father, Rudric, and then, to top it all off, Janner!!
I guess the point of this rant is just to say that I really liked Rudric for several reasons, and I'm really sorry that he died.
**pants* All right. Rant is over. Have a sandwich. 🥪🥪🥪
Rudric is one of my favorite characters! However, I don't really like the way his story goes; he's a good character and he deserved better. If there's one thing I could change about the plot of the books, I would change Rudric killing Esben on accident (so terrible!), and also his dying in book 4. It just seemed so unnecesarily tragic. Changing these two things wouldn't change much in the events of the story, except that Nia would have a husband in the end.