Ok, hear me out. I've been up all night the last two nights doing as much research as I can without my books in front of me. (They are in storage atm and I will be retrieving them today)

The enigma of what the Menoa Tree has taken from Eragon has led me down the rabbit whole of reading the entire Q&A thread for the last two AMAs looking for any sort of answer. Now I think I saw somewhere that u/CristopherPaolini had said that what was taken was something physical. If I get confirmation on that, the following theories are debunked and I will go insane trying to figure out what it is.

Theory 1: The Menoa Tree took away Eragon's lust. Or whatever the equivalent would be to making it so that he only ever loved Arya and could never choose another lover. (Someone else did mention this on twitter and I commented on it so if it's true, they get credit for voicing it first. However, I've thought this for some time)

Theory 2: Someone said his first born child. Perhaps this is far fetched but it was mentioned that there is similar lore about a deity taking an Urgal's first born in return for something.

Theory 3: It's speculated that somehow Eragon was given an eldunari during the agaeti blohdren (sp?) and that she took it in order to live a longer life/have control or influence over him.

Theory 4: I only saw this mentioned once but it's probably the coolest theory out there. Someone said that Saphira's fire was taken which comes from her belly and that Eragon felt a sympathy pain. However, having no use for the fire, Menoa put the fire into the brightsteel which gave brisngr the ability to catch fire and gave the sword it's true name. Saphira's fire being taken however, means that she won't be able to use it at all anymore. (Despite liking this the most, I'm pretty sure that Saphira uses fire in Inheritance)

Theory 5: This also makes sense aligning with Menoa telling Eragon to go at the end of Inheritance. Someone mentioned rather than taking anything, the Menoa put a seed in Eragon that would spread her influence wherever he went, hence why she is adamant that he "go" and she refuses any other dialogue. However, I did explicitly see a tweet from Christopher that stated something was in fact taken so this theory may also have no validity.

These are what I found to be the most likely out of everything I've read from others with theory 1 being my own thoughts echoed by someone like-minded.

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My theory on Angela is that she is one of two things: one of the grey folk, or, THE deity of the world.

Hear me out, she has many names, she's probably one of the oldest beings in the world, and she's able to transcend dimensions. We all know that she's in the Fraktal Verse so this isn't far fetched. The hard part is finding out if she is the only one or if there are multiple. I will even go so far as to say she is Guntera. This would explain the fear shown when she kills the priest of Helgrind and why she would shield/could shield herself from Elva. Plus her prophecies being true all the time makes you think she's omniscient. And don't come at me about scrying or knuckle bones. That could all be show for her cover as Angela rather than Inare or Guntera or whatever you'd call the deity of the world.

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Side note: if Angela is not THE deity, but one of them as the grey folk do have the makings of deities, then that leads to what/who is Guntera? Guntera would more than likely be one of the grey folk, but I also have a theory that Christopher is going to put himself into the universe as Guntera. After all, he says that if he had his choice, he'd be a dwarf. What better dwarf to be than THE dwarf?

Anyways, that's my two cents/rant. If y'all think anything is remotely right, feel free to let me know. Or berate me, whichever. And I will be speed reading the books and taking notes along the way so I will have an update if I find anything.