Okay, not really, Iâm making stew for dinner, but I love Shrek.
Grace wakes up mid-way through the morning because she is skipping school again today. This time she didnât even decide on it; Macy and her dad decided and just failed to wake her up. A simple sprained ankle is enough to get her out of class, somehow. Itâs like this book set in a board school is allergic to having the main character actually go to school.
While getting ready, Grace lets slip that sheâs talked to Jaxon a few times and Macy flips out because Jaxon is so reclusiveâŠbut also popular? Presumably something to do with weird vampire power hierarchies, I mean later we find out thereâs a vampire King and Queen. Of course, thatâs all we find out, which is really annoying. Oh the things we could have learned if this book didnât spend 300 pages pointlessly hiding things from Grace!
After Lia making a dramatic statement only to completely undermine it a second later, we carry on with our complete lack of drama. Because we are 100 pages into this beast, thatâs clearly far too soon for an actual plot to emerge.
Back at her dorm room, Grace wakes up Macy and they talk about what just happened. ItâsâŠwhat just happened. But for three more pages. To be fair, at least Macy seems outraged on her cousinâs behalf.
Jaxon leaves and Graceâs uncle arrives. Because weâre playing musical characters in this random hallway for some reason. They make small-talk for abut two pages before Uncle Finn just bounces. Wow, super important.
Once upon a time, a woman named Lynne Freeman wrote a book. Like many authors before her, she shopped this book around looking for an agent, and eventually signed with Emily Sylvan Kim. Kim then proceeded to (ALLEGEDLY) take that manuscript and hand it off to her friend, Tracy Wolff. Kim also, (ALLEGEDLY) pressed Freeman into continually revising the manuscript so that Wolff could (ALLEGEDLY) use that material in her own working manuscript, which (ALLEGEDLY) became the best-selling series Crave.
I'm having trouble getting my hands on a copy of either of my unfinished review books (Diviners and Aurora Rising) so I'm debating if I should move on to a new book or wait for the mail to deliver.
I have to admit, I donât have much to say about the fight scenes in this book. But thatâs mostly because itâs magic people fighting other magic people with magic. When you get to make up every aspect of the rules and physics, who am I to naysay?
Except for throwing the daggers. THOSE FUCKING DAGGERS.
Violet, Xaden, and their headquarters group take a break on the way to their new base.
My thighs are sore and cramping, but itâs not quite as bad as it was Montserrat. The extra hours in the saddle this last month have helped.
I swear to god, this book would be exactly the same if you took Violetâs EDS completely out of it. She spent her whole life as a bookworm and got thrown into the cavalry and that, by itself, explains all of her problems as depicted in the text.
Violet decides to walk out to the middle of the parapet to be with Xaden becauseâŠ.???? He seems fine out there. Just moping. Sitting there, chillin. Some of his friends are at the end of the bridge keeping an eye on him and they donât seem concerned. Itâs the anniversary of when his parents died; let him be dramatic!
Well. âA breakâ wasnât supposed to last that long. But here we go again.
Violet is in shock over killing Jack, because while you can intellectually know that itâs inevitable, actually doing it is something else. Theyâve won the little war game and everyone runs around being happy and congratulating Violet on getting a signet while she stands there just thinking âIâve killed someoneâ over and over.
The domain ReadingWithAVengeance.com now points to the new blog instead of the tumblr. Yes, that's right, I'm moving my content to be mainly hosted on a dedicated blog. New posts will still be posted here, but they will be a link to RWAV.com.
I'll be posting a few Fourth Wing posts per day over there until I'm all caught up, and then it'll be one new post a day as usual. Or...as un-usual. >.>
This is it, yâall. This is the chapter Iâve been waiting for. This is the chapter that made me so mad I had to temporarily stop reading.
BUT FIRST! Each chapter opens with a little bit of in-universe flavor text, something from an in-universe book or from Brennanâs diary. Mostly itâs just worldbuilding nuggets that are fine but not relevant. This time we get:
Winning the War Games isnât about strength. Itâs about cunning. [âŠ] No one stays friends forever, Mira. Eventually those closest to us become our enemies in some way, even if itâs through will-intentioned love or apathy, or if we live long enough to become their villains.
Esprit de corps, motherfucker, ever heard of it?
I canât even claim that the school, as we have seen so far, actually does this, but if thatâs the intention (the authorâs intention/the schoolâs intention/whatever) then itâs dumb as fuck because theyâre a military. You want them to work together. Hell, last chapter we had Mira pointing out that unit cohesion is important! This book just has no sense of consistency in what kind of vibe it wants these riders to have.
Anyway, War Games is basically Squad Battle on ten shots of espresso and itâs coming up soon.
Itâs two days after the events of last chapter and Violet is pestering one of her teachers for news of Mira and her squad. Xaden is hanging around with her, for support and also for bantering opportunities. They pounce on the teacher as soon as he comes out of his office and ask for information. The teacher says the whole incident is classified, but after some pestering at least tells Violet that no one died. Her sister is safe.
Thereâs a bunch of summary and then we skip ahead to the first day of War Games. Itâs wing vs wing and one side is defending while another attacks. There are certain items in play that are worth points. The defending wing has a valuable dragon egg (fake) and the attacking wing has a less valuable flag and theyâre going to go out and try to steal from each other. Finally, an exercise in this nonsense college that makes some amount of sense.
They walk out to the flight field to mount up and Tairn shows up in a saddle.
A fucking saddle.
A FUCKING SADDLE.
âI canât use that.â I shake my head. âItâs not allowed.â
âI decide whatâs allowed and whatâs not,â Tairn growls
WHY IS IT NOW ALLOWED, BOOK? WHY? WHY DO YOU HATE SENSE THIS MUCH? WHO DISALLOWED IT?
Clearly the dragons donât mind because Tairn is right here like âfuck it, this makes more sense and itâs not even uncomfortable and Iâm find with itâ and yet FOR SOME REASON itâs ânot allowedâ????
SAYS FUCKING WHO?
I have never been so mad at a FUCKING SADDLE before in my life, not because the saddle is bad but because itâs existence here means ITâS POSSIBLE AND YâALL KNOW ITâS POSSIBLE AND YOU DIDNâT DO IT BEFORE NOW AND JUST FUCKING WHY?
But I know why. Itâs because the author wanted to write in a scene about disability accommodations. Itâs clear in this interview she gives.
I can only speak for myself here, but there are plenty of times I donât want to accept accommodations. I want to be capable of accomplishing the same feats as my peersâlike signing thousands of books a day when necessaryâwithout complaint or injury. But I also recognize that itâs not possible. My wrist simply wonât hold out and thereâs every chance my hip will slide out when I sit incorrectly, or Iâll pass out when my heart races due to POTS.
Violet accepts the accommodations she absolutely has to in order to be a dragon rider. She can definitely get in her own way and put her body through too much at times because of her stubbornness, which Iâve found to be a personal theme in my life. Accepting and asking for appropriate accommodations is a very personal journey, and it was important for me to show that in Fourth Wing for readers who may or may not struggle with the same choices.
And that is a noble goal. In fact, throughout this scene Violet is furious about being presented with an accommodation has to be talked into it, with other people and her dragons pointing out that this isnât a failing and her life will be better and stronger if she takes it and she has complex feelings about it but ultimately accepts. And itâs good. On an emotional level, at least. Itâs written with some strong emotion that comes through clearly and thatâs great!
But why is about a fucking saddle?
PEOPLE HAVE DIED, BOOK.
CHARACTERS HAVE FALLEN OFF THEIR SEAT AND DIED MULTIPLE TIMES SO FAR.
WHY DONâT THEY GET A SADDLE?
WHY IS THE ONE FUCKING ACCOMMODATION THIS????
I am so absolutely furious because itâs an âaccommodationâ that makes sense to an abled person because we all know what saddles are itâs just too fucking obvious. Itâs something everyone already uses. There is going to be zero need to change any minds or thoughts when a character is given a saddle because itâs just âoh, yeah, of courseâ and also IT MAKES NO SENSE THAT THEY DIDNâT ALREADY HAVE ONE.
Look at that quote above. The author talks about how her hip slips out if she just sits for too long. Why not use that? Why not have saddles that she canât use because theyâre too wide and prolonged sitting messes up her joints? Why not have to modify her saddle into something that makes people go âwow, princess, you need a chaise lounge there?â Because in this book itâs a normal saddle and exactly zero other characters in the story have a problem with it.
Why doesnât this book challenge literally anything about ableist ideas?
AND WHO IN-UNIVERSE SAID THAT RIDERS CANâT HAVE SADDLES IâM STILL MAD ABOUT THAT ONE.
Also itâs dumb as shit that this comes up the same day as their field exercise because she has no chance to practice with it or get used to it or find out if, IDK, having her legs tied in place just pulls her hip joint out while theyâre making hard turns. Feels like thatâs something you need to safety test before you go into a battle with it, mock or not.
But this book cares shit all about safety procedures so off we go to have a little battle. Andarna decides she wants to come to. Sure, we havenât seen her much this book, come on along.
Violet finds out she really loves flying when sheâs not terrified of falling off all the time and her magic starts getting all sparky, implying she was too tense to manifest a signet before.
Violetâs group comes across another bunch of dragons and itâs quickly clear that this group is guarding the fake egg. Also this book still doesnât understand what âtrainingâ is and has the kids go after each other with full on magic and live weapons because sure, why the fuck not. Letâs burn some students to death. Thatâll help things.
One of the egg defenders is Jack, who is being his usual dumbass self and picks Liam to grapple with. The dragons are fighting very close together in midair because sure, why not, and Jack jumps onto Liamâs dragon so he can go do a stabbity-stab.
Violet and Tairn go into a desperate dive to catch Liam after he falls off his dragon, and Violet has to stop time again for a second so they can catch up and save him. Afterwards, Violet is furious and looks around for Jack to enact some revenge. Surprising herself and everyone else, she finally manifests her special powers and fries him to death with lightning.
Today we cover the fabled Squad Battle. Everyone engages in an obstacle course run, a sparring tournament, and a secret third thing.
Iâm so tired of the sparing-but-with-knives in this book. Itâs likeâŠthe only thing that happens. Thereâs a vague mention of weapon proficiency tests, but we donât see anything like that, nor do we see them do any training except one-on-one on the mats here. (Well, not training, but you know.) Are they expected to do all of their fighting solo? Is there no training on how to work as a unit? The only thing we know they do with dragons is fly, occasionally in formation, but that isnât covered well either. Itâs just odd to me how individual everything in this school is.
All the better to make sure Violet gets to be special but also never a liability, I guess. We can cry about her shortcomings in abstract, but thatâs it.
Fortunately we skip straight to the secret third thing, which is to have all of the squads identify and obtain something âadvantageous to our enemies regarding the war effort.â Our kids huddle up and start tossing around ideas, until Violet realizes that the best option is to steal information from her momâs office. (I like it because someone else said âinformationâ first, and Violet is uniquely knowledgeable in her momâs office, so itâs not quite as special snowflake as sheâs been thus far in the book.)
They make plans off page and we come back to them sneaking through the fortress. Sneaking loudly, because they canât stop bantering. Sure would be nice if theyâd had some classes in squad movements, or mission planning, or literally anything. Fortunately, this college is also as nonsense as the kids are so they donât get caught. One of the squad members lures the only guard out of the way using an astral projection, they break into the poor lock on the door, and they start searching the office.
They end up stealing a giant map that has the current location and strength of every military unit the nation has, and after a brief skirmish with the guard again, they get back to the judges and win game. Overall a pretty competent chapter.
Of course, their âprizeâ for winning is a trip to the front lines which isâŠconfusing. If this is something thatâs supposed to be useful, then everyone should be getting it. However itâs not a pleasant outing so itâs not a prize in that regard. Whatâs so prize-ful about this? Feels like the author just wanted the book to go here and thereâs the only reason.
They head to a fort called Montserrat, which it turns out is very close to Rhiannanâs home. She and Violet immediately make plans to sneak out. While the squad is touring the place, we find out that one of the riders stationed there is Mira. Oops, sorry, no time for a sisterly reunion here, we immediately skip to two days later.
Violet and Rhiannon are going to sneak out to visit her family, and they get caught by Mira. They hastily convince Mira not to tattle, and then convince her to join them. A whole paragraph later, Rhiannon is happily reunited with her family and meeting her newborn nephew for the first time, and Violet and Mira sit outside and chitchat.
That was a lot of shuffling around for a sisterly chat that could have happened several pages earlier.
The sisterly chat involvesâŠtactical discussions. So loving. Mira relays some of the places sheâs seen action, and Violet notices again that thereâs a lot of things going on that donât get covered in battle brief. Iâm annoyed that this foreshadowing comes up again, because Mira gives the same excuse we had last time: youâre in school, you donât need to know every single detail of the tactical situation, some of which is above your clearance level. Because, thatâs legit! The way it comes up, the book wants us to think this is something suspicious, but itâs not!
Also, Mira has the book of fables that Violet loves and couldnât find at the library.
And then, low and behold, Xaden shows up. Turns out that about three days is the max time that bonded dragons will put up with being separated. Xaden takes to chilling in the background while the squad goes about theirâŠuh, âprize.â (It occurs to me that family visits could have been the prize and this all would have played out exactly the same.)
Today they are talking through battle scenarios and the kids are doing my favorite trick of âIâm going to ruin this game by taking everything you say literally.â
âThereâs a new fort here on this map and-â
âThey built it in a day?â
âUgh, fine, they took over an existing one and-â
âThe locals didnât notice and warn us?â
âI hate all of you.â
No really, it is my favorite game, lol. Even if it is unhelpful. Miraâs attempts to lead this little thought exercise are even more hindered by Dain sniping at Xaden every chance he gets and Xaden finding that amusing.
Once they finally struggle their way through how to retake the fictional outpost, Mira calls an end to the class so she can chew out Dain in relative privacy. She rightfully points out that heâs being an ass, destroying his squadâs cohesion, and ruining any chance at being a wingleader.
Then she moves on to yelling at Violet and Xaden saying they need to figure out a better fix for this whole âcanât be separatedâ thing, because next year Xaden will no longer be in school. She intimates that forcing Violet out of her training and preventing her from being successful might be Xadenâs plan of retribution. Canât believe weâre still on this. It would help if Xaden had literally done anything mean ever.
Mid-fight, they get news that a bunch of gryphons on the way. This book uses the collective noun âdrift of gryphonsâ which I really like. And also âriot of dragons.â Okay, enough linguistics. Violet insists on staying to help, but fortunately for my sanity literally everyone in the book is against that idea. They point out that not only is she untrained, but so are all of her friends and theyâd probably die in a real fight. Even given that, she has to be practically dragged out and shoved on to Tairn in order to escape.
Violet and Rhiannon discuss the make-out in the way that best friends have always discussed embarrassing make-outs. Much wailing, teasing, and gossip. Rhiannon reveals that she got her special magic, which is to summon/teleport things. Any rider can use the lesser magic to telekinetic things, but teleporting is special. Apparently itâs rare and uber special, just like every other power a main character has. Go figure.
On the way to their class, Dain stops Violet and wants to talk. Heâs very hurt that she wouldnât share her memory of the attack with him, but she would share it with everyone. Violet has to point out that he never asked her to share, he just reached out to grab her head.
She also unloads on him about the way heâs treated her thus far, trying to get her out of the college and trying to protect her. Which makes sense if the main hangup was sexism or something, or if task wasnât something very physically dangerous that she didnât want. But she has EDS and is in a murder college that doesnât take basic safety seriously and also bodily throws people around, which as far as Dain knows she doesnât and never did want to be part of. Getting her out is the most logical response in the world.
Emotionally, as a mostly able-bodied reader, Violetâs reaction to him makes sense to me. I feel it. Itâs well done. Until I back out a scootch and then remember Violet is very different and, idk, probably shouldnât be reacting in the same way that I would?
But the Riderâs Quadrant stripped away the fear and even the anger about being thrown into this quadrant, and it revealed who I really am. At my core, Dain, Iâm a rider.
âŠwhen? How? Weâve been in this chickâs head the entire time and nothing about her thoughts has changed. I would say nothing about her feelings, as well, but outside of fear and horny her feelings mostly arenât described. She can be a very distant narrator when good things are going on.
We get a quick summary of the next month or so, including the news that Violet won two of her sparing-with-a-chance-of-murder matches.
I did a quick look for EDS people doing martial arts and found several redit posts of people talking about their experience. Thereâs some jargon I donât get, but the overall consensus seems to be: plenty of people do it, but you have to be really careful, inform all of your partners ahead of time, and even then people usually quit or scale back within a couple of years. And these are people doing it as a sport, so they can come up with work-arounds when necessary, not people going to a class and saying âyeah, just fuck me up, coach.â
Violet finds out that her next match is against Jack, and she talks to Liam about it. Theyâre both worried about Jackâs hard-on for murdering her. Funny enough, no one has ever mentioned that Jack is good at anything. She beat two other people (without poisoning them first) and itâs brushed over, but Jack prompts a whole conversation. During which, at no point, does anyone say âoh no, but heâs so good at fighting!â Just saying.
Violetâs narration slyly hints that sheâs got something up her slee- itâs orange juice. Come on, youâre not sly there, book. Itâs so obviously orange juice. You bungled your chance to try and be secret with that one.
They get to the gym and find out who is challenging who and everyone is all GASP about Jack/Violet and Iâm still not convinced Jack is even good at anything.
They fight, itâs kind of standard. Jack gets her in an arm lock and tries to stab her.
âHeâs using death blows!â Ridoc shouts. âThatâs not allowed!â
âPull it back, Barlowe!â [Professor] Emetterio bellows.
It is? Since when? Also, why do they have knives if not allowed to stab each other? And if you really donât want kids to stab each other, thatâs a pretty weak response.
There is more fighting, more non-lethal stabbing (which is fine?), until finally Jack gets the upper hand by using some sort of magic thatâŠhurts? Itâs described as âpouring energy into her body and that causes agonyâ so his signet is literally just hurting people? Bit on the nose, book.
Violet keeps herself together long enough to dump her vial of orange juice in his mouth and send him into allergy shock that way, and then she tells the teacher what she did and passes out.
She wakes up in the infirmary with Xaden watching over her. Since she told the staff what she gave Jack, they were able to treat him in time and heâs alive, which Xaden is unhappy about.
So go kill him or whatever. This book cannot decide if it wants to be a real murder college or not.
Violet wants to talk about the kiss from a month ago that he still hasnât addressed, and Xaden brushes it off. Heâs all âweâre going to be stuck together because of our dragons, letâs not make it even more awkward by getting involved.â And then he decides heâs going to take over her hand-to-hand training because oh no she almost got killed thatâs scary he definitely hasnât already caught feelings.
Which they start doing the next day.
She still has stitches. She passed out.
âThe enemy doesnât give a shit if youâre wounded. Theyâll use it to their advantage. If you donât know how to fight in pain, then youâll get us both killed.â
Being a solider is going to age a person, because actually you canât just take damage over and over again and keep trucking. Thatâs why I have a bum leg. Thatâs why my best army friend has a shitty back. Another of my friends is missing half the muscles in this arm. Thereâs a whole slew of us that that took metaphorical hits until we couldnât anymore and then retired.
Few of those hits came in training. A few did, sure, but most came from doing the job. And thatâs because thereâs only so many you can take before youâre down for good so better put them to good use. Wrecking yourself during training isnât helpful, it just ups the odds that youâll never make it to active duty and shortens the amount of time youâre useful while active. That is why training is simulated and has safety rails.
An able-bodied person would already be retired from how much damage the characters in this book have been through.
But no, gotta keep on trucking, becauseâŠreasons. Rule of cool. Shit.
Getting hurt doesnât train you; it just hurts.
Xaden claims that sheâs good with daggers but itâs too easy to take them from her because theyâre not ⊠made for her body type? No clue what this means. He unveils a bunch of daggers that he had made just for her. They are apparently very pretty and have special carvings, but we donât find out what would make them more body-type-appropriate. Possibly heâs making shit up in order to not say that theyâve got special magic that will be important later, but I feel like Violet should call him out if itâs meant to be a lie and sheâs meant to be soooo smart. Â
Because the nonsense rules of this school say you can only have a weapon if you brought it with you or won it in a fight, sheâs got to fight him for them. He makes it absurdly easy, they flirt a lot, and now Violet has 12 new daggers.
Another month goes by, and we come to again with the friends talking about signet powers. Apparently one kid died because his fire powers manifested too strongly and he burned himself. Oops. (See? There are plenty of ways for kids to die here without also making things unsafe on purpose!) Violet is nervous about her own special powers not showing up.
Iâm proving to be the one thing my mother hates â average.
What the ever-loving fuck? You have TWO dragons, one of which is the biggest ever! The dragons claim youâre the smartest kid in the year! Youâve poisoned multiple people! Also, powers never showing up is rare so even in that case you wouldnât be average at all! Dead, but not average!
Sorry, book, but youâve put too much time into making her special to pull this off now.
They talk some about this Squad Games thing thatâs coming up, and then Violet gets pulled out of classes to go have a meeting with the brass. Her mom is there, too. Thereâs some tension between mother and daughter, the group asks for permission to study Andarna (no), and thereâs little nuggets dropped in about future plot points. Relevant nuggets dropped naturally, not like the oranges thing, which makes that bit even weirder. The book can do this right, so why was that one so wrong?
Violet now has to go about her day with Liam playing bodyguard, including when she goes to do her library chores. Fortunately, heâs pretty chill to get along with. Unfortunately, heâs very dedicated to being a bodyguard.
While at the library and waiting for requests to be pulled, they chat about Xaden. Specifically, how Liam and Xaden know each other, other than just the general âwe are the kids of traitors and taking on collective punishment for it.â Liam and Xaden went to the same foster house, when all the kids were divvied up among loyal families. Violet is surprised to hear about the extra cruelties heaped on this group, such as both of Liamâs parents being killed and not just the traitor parents, or how his sister was sent to a different house. There are 107 of these kids ranging in age from 23 to 6.
And thatâs as much as Liam wants to make small talk about his traumatic past. Understandable.
Jesinia comes back to hand over the books, make doe eyes at Liam, and deliver a report for one of the teachers. On the way out, they drop the scroll report and catch a bit of news about a village being attacked, but they donât read deeply because they figure theyâll be going over it in class.
This chapter has a lot of random little bits in it, small talk that goes nowhere, but itâs cool. I like it. Theyâre trying to establish rapport between Violet and Liam and I like that best when itâs done through small and calm moments. Just doesnât make for good summarizing.
Later the kids are chatting and teasing before their battle brief class. Violet is upset about Xaden, the others poke at her for having a crush on him, itâs all very friendly. But two pages earlier we had:
âSympathyâ isnât a word found in our quadrant. Thereâs rage, wrath, and indignationâŠbut no sympathy.
And yet a lot of the downtime in this book is Violet hanging out with her friends and having, I will admit, pretty well written banter and small talk. Itâs chill and shows good friendship, and Rhiannon consistently cares about Violetâs wellbeing. This book feels like the writer couldnât commit to brutality so figured that Violetâs thoughts could patch the holes, but it comes off disjointed instead.
âOh, are we telling dick jokes now?â Ridoc asks from Liamâs side. âBecause my entire life has led up to this very moment.â
Heh. I laughed.
We get our first mention of something called Squad Battle, which is pretty self-explanatory. Winners this year get a trip to the front lines. Because�?? Plot?
But then class starts in earnest and thereâs no mention of the village that Violet read about earlier. She finds that odd, then dismisses it. Sheâs a student, after all, of course she doesnât know everything that the teachers are told.
A whole month goes by. We rejoin the characters during a sparring practice.
Per [Dainâs] recent orders, Tuesday nights are for squad hand-to-hand combat practice, because the full academic load weâre carrying, coupled with flight lessons and now wielding instructions for some of us isnât leaving much time for the mat.
ButâŠwhy is it not one of your classes? Even West Point makes you take PT and combatives and maneuvers and all that shit. Or is it one of the classes and we just never find out? Weâve had mention of a history class and a physics class, and lord knows I donât want to sit in on them, but some sort of mention of what her day-to-day looks like would be really helpful. Especially since fighting and flying is all that this school seems to care about, but all it gives instruction about isâŠnot those things.
The weekly fights start again in a month, because we have to give time for Violet to heal from the various things that have tried to kill her recently. Wait, no, thatâs not the reason, itâs becauseâŠ.uhâŠ.reasons?
We get distracted for a full two pages because Xaden takes his shirt off to practice sparring. In case you were curious, heâs still hot.
Jack pipes up from his own practice to mock Violet for being short and weak. Again. And then mid-rant this happens:
[Jackâs] friend from First Wing offers him something â a slice of the orange heâs eating â and Jack shoves his hand away at the wrist. âGet that noxious shit away from me. Do you want me to end up in the infirmary?â
So, pretty clearly Jack is allergic to oranges and this becomes relevant later. And also pretty clearly, this fact had to be established in the editing stage. But why did it get shoved into THIS scene? There have been so many scenes in the chow hall where it would have much far more natural, but no, thereâs just a guy randomly shoving oranges in his face during a workout?
Violet taunts Jack back and then her various bodyguards have to remove him from the gym because he flies into a rage about it. This kidâŠis not good military material. I mean, lord knows Iâve seen tons of people who werenât suited for it back when the army was in recruitment mode, so Iâm not saying he canât be here. I just felt like pointed it out. If they werenât hard-up for bodies in this military I would seriously be questioning why heâs allowed to stay.
Violet, Dain, and Xaden get in an angry sniping match at each other, but because Violet doesnâtâŠidk, stab someone, the dragons decide that counts as controlling her temper and that sheâs ready to channel some magic now. Weird criteria, since a short temper has been part of her character thus far.
Later that night, Violet is suddenly overcome with power. Because the dragons decided to start channeling to her but also waited several hours? It knocks her over pretty good until she gets used to it, but afterwards sheâs excited to go tell her friends. When she leaves her room, Liam is there standing guard in the hallway, and sheâs suddenly overcome by how hot he is and how much she wants to jump his bones.
Thankfully, she figures out pretty quickly that Tairn is getting his dragon bones on and the lusty thoughts are a spillover effect. To avoid doing something regrettable with/to Liam, she beats a hasty retreat and then sneaks outside to be alone in the cold. Itâs not as helpful as hoped.
Also Xaden is out there for the same reason. Smoking a fantasy cigarette. Because we can have November and December in this fantasy world, but we canât have tobacco. (No really, they use the same weekday names and month names.)
Xaden laughs at her going through this the first time, until he realizes sheâs getting it worse because she hasnât been taught how to block out the dragonâs thoughts/feelings yet.
âYouâre actually going to help me?â
âIâve been helping you for months.â [âŠ]
âNo, you sent Liam to help. [âŠ]â
âIâm the one who burst through your door and killed everyone who attacked you, and then I removed the other threat to your life with a very public, very polarizing display of vengeance. Liam didnât do that. I did.â
I mean, yeah all that but also heâs been giving her advice throughout the book so far and also HASNâT EVER TRIED TO HURT HER. So bored with this.
âHave you always been this tall?â I blurt the first thing that comes to mind.
Itâs just Violetâs reactions to him that are sooooooo overdone and annoying.
Violet herself isnât that bad either. Sheâs just in the wrong story, so she doesnât make sense. Thereâs a version of all this that could have been so much better. Let Violet be a scribe. Let her deal with her disability there. Let her and Xaden have some real danger between them, which goes unrealized because they rarely meet being in different quadrants. Let her then bond to Tairn anyway, probably through some shenanigans. Then we can skip the nonsense danger school, we can have a whole thing about how humans have been imposing their own standards on dragons, Xaden can honestly struggle with his life being tied to a mortal enemy, etc etc.
Alas, we donât have that, we have Nonsense Murder School and Toxic Perseverance instead.
Xaden teaches her to block out the dragons usingâŠimagination. Itâs all just visualizing stuff. She takes to it immediately, despite all this supposedly being very hard to do. I guess she has âextreme motivationâ on her side, what with all the dragon lust.
Shielding canât block out your dragon completely, though, so Violet is still horny. Conveniently, so is Xaden. Also conveniently, heâs still super hot. Much make-out ensues. This author comes from the romance genre, and it shows. This is not a complaint, the make-out is perfectly fine, itâs just a particular style, lol.
Xaden breaks it off first, realizing that theyâll never be able to tell how much of that lust is genuine and therefore carrying on could be a big mistake. Violet ends the chapter going home and feeling horribly embarrassed.
So the little gold dragon has managed to stop time to save Violet from getting stabbed.
Xaden, alerted by the dragons, kicked in the door right before the time freeze, so Violet stumbles over to his side right before time starts up again. Poor Andarna canât hold frozen time for long. Xaden is furious, and a short bit of begging from Oren and the others doesnât help.
Xadenâs shadows grab every assailant but Oren by the throat, then constrict. They struggle, but it doesnât matter. Their faces turn purple, the shadows holding tight as they sag to their knees, falling in an arc in front of me like lifeless puppets.
SoâŠnot shadows? Basically his power is just some sort of demon forcefield thatâs dark like shadows? Who knows, because this book has zero care for the fact that shadows donât have mass.
Itâs a shame because someoneâs powers being legitimately just shadows would be interesting. Thereâs lots of limitations there, but limitations is where creativity thrives. I read someone once describe liking The Flash as like âheâs only got one power and he has to figure out how to use it to solve every problem, whereas Superman has every power but uses all of them to just punch.â (And yeah, Superman has other interesting things, but his powers ainât one of them.)
Oren, being the only named character in the room, gets to be murdered by more conventional, knifey means.
Garrick and Bodhi, two marked kids that are part of Xadenâs general friend group, show up out of nowhere and basically go âaw, we missed it all, bummer.â They get started on cleanup duty like theyâve done this a million times before. HmmmmâŠ.
Violet is currently freaking the fuck out, due to the murder attempt, the display of murderous power, and the fact that she has broken ribs. So naturally Xaden has to tend to her wounds. Which mostly consists of trying to get her to calm down and looking very mad at her bruises.
Oh, and taking off her armor to get a better look at her injuries. Of course. Canât forget that.
Once all the bodies are removed from her room, Xaden gets Violet out and practically drags her up to the flight field, bickering all the way. Mostly about random stuff. Violet points out that heâs fully dressed at 2am and so were all of his marked buddies, but Xaden declines to explain.
At the field, all three dragons are waiting for them. Her two dragons and his one. And Xaden starts yelling and scolding at house-sized Mr. Tairn, which is kind of funny.
Turns out they can all talk to each other. Thanks to Tairn and Sgaeyl being mates, those two dragons and the two humans are all telepathic with each other. Andarna is out of the loop, but meh.
Xaden wants to know what kind of magic happened back there in the room because from his viewpoint it looks like Violet teleported.
The dragons explain that what happened wasnât a signet. Andarna is too young to do the mixing between dragon and human that produces a signet, but she can directly give her own magic to Violet and let Violet wield it. Itâs risky to do because a rider taking too much could kill the dragon. Also we find out that Andarna is only two years old and will get bigger, and it seems that yes feathertail is a baby thing not a breed thing.
There is much bickering among the group, mostly the humans yelling at the dragons for letting essentially a child bond and the dragons being like âeh, sheâs very willful.â They all agree to keep this time-stopping thing a secret, since itâs way too powerful and also a baby dragon thing and the dragons donât want humans to know what their babies can do.
We also find out that Violet recognized someone in the murder group, someone who got away. A rider who let the others into the room and then bounced.
The next morning at formation, Violet and Rhiannon talk about how surprising it is that they tried to kill her.
âEven worse, I think Iâm getting used to it.â Either I have kick-ass compartmentalization skills or I really yam acclimating to always being a target.
This book has talked about her always being a target far more than it has actually targeted her. The only two times anyone has actually tried to do a murder before this, itâs been Jack, and the rest of the âthreatâ has been people standing still while Violet goes âaaah!â
To be honest, I feel like thereâs a perfectly fine amount of murder in this school if you take out them talking about it. The lack-of-safety-based deaths are completely absurd, but other than that itâs just one severely disturbed kid and a bunch of dragons. Without Violet getting spooked at shadows, the rest is fine and the night time murder attempt is appropriately shocking.
Oh and also letâs take some time to muse about how sexy Xaden is, why not.
Xaden switches a kid named Liam into Violetâs squad. Liam is a first year in Xadenâs inner circle and Violet immediately groks onto the fact that heâs there to bodyguard her. Violet is particularly pissed about this and insists that she doesnât need a bodyguard, which makes sense if we follow what actually happens in the school and doesnât make sense if we follow what Violet tells us about the school.
Well, I mean, it makes sense if Violet considers the previous night to be an aberration that is unlikely to happen again. It makes sense as a stupid thing that a character might do because people are illogical. But following her pages and pages of âoh no, this place is so dangerous, everyone wants me dead, Iâm a target if I take crutchesâ talk, itâs out of step.
And itâs a disconnect thatâs been present throughout. The author maybe just didnât have time to add in all the personal danger she wanted, or maybe just didnât feel it necessary, or just lost the thread while writing, but something got dropped probably in the editing stage. Because through the whole thing the book wants us to think that Violet is in danger but canât bear to have her react appropriately to such becauseâŠidk, probably for the same ableist reason that Violet refuses medical care. Because thereâs a strict view of what a strong and tough character looks like and the protagonist isnât allowed to deviate from it.
Anyway, the kids donât have time to argue too much about the bodyguard thing, because formation isnât over. Side note, why do they have the time and space to chat incessantly during morning formations? Eh, nothing else this military has done has shown decent discipline, I guess. The command announces that someone has been accused of breaking one of the Big Rules, andâŠhandling this with the appropriate authorities just isnât how they do things here, I guess. Instead they handle it in front of the whole school by having Xaden walk up front and air his grievances.
Because of course. How else could the viewpoint character relay the scene to us? (By being a direct witness to the violation and thus involved in whatever trial happens? Psh, nah.)
Xaden announces to the whole formation (why?????? Ugh) the events of last chapter and then names Amber as the rider who facilitated the attack. Sheâs a bit character who is friends with Dain and doesnât like Violet. Dain is incensed by the accusation and demands that Violet deny it, then tries to touch her to get her memories of the previous night. She refuses, mostly because Dain is being an ass about it.
Apparently Xaden makes his accusation publicly but then after that all the leadership gets in a huddle to argue about it and just omg why is this happening in this forum????? Violet asks Tairn to share her memory â but just the Amber parts of it â withâŠeveryone. Apparently thatâs possible, dragons are just generally telepathic and itâs not an actual function of any bond. This fact is literally never brought up again. Itâs rude toâŠtalk widely, I guess.
With everyone now having seen Amber in the room breaking the very specific rule of âno murder while sleeping,â she is sentenced to death and immediately burned by a dragon.