Fourth Wing (The Empyrean, #1)

by Rebecca Yarros

You want to kill her, you’ll have to do it in the sparring ring or on your own time. That is, if she decides to let you off the parapet. Because technically, you’re not on the grounds yet, so you are not a cadet. She is.”

A dragon without its rider is a tragedy. A rider without their dragon is dead.

“Her mom is responsible for the capture of nearly all our parents,” Garrick counters, folding his arms over his wide chest. “Not her daughter. Punishing children for the sins of their parents is the Navarrian way, not the Tyrrish.”

“Fascinating. You look all frail and breakable, but you’re really a violent little thing, aren’t you?”

Hope is a fickle, dangerous thing. It steals your focus and aims it toward the possibilities instead of keeping it where it belongs—on the probabilities.”

“People die,” he says slowly, his jaw ticking before he drags in a deep breath. “It’s going to happen over and over again. It’s the nature of what happens here. What makes you a rider is what you do after people die.

I didn’t believe it before, not when I couldn’t leave because my mother wouldn’t let me, but now I have a choice. And I choose to stay.

“Dain lost his vote when he tried talking you into leaving,” she counters.

“I know exactly who and what you are, Violet Sorrengail.”

“You are the smartest of your year. The most cunning.” I gulp at the compliment, brushing it off. I was trained as a scribe, not a rider. “You defended the smallest with ferocity. And strength of courage is more important than physical strength. Since you apparently need to know before we land.”

“They’re a mated pair, Tairn and Sgaeyl. The strongest bonded pair in centuries.” My mind whirs. Mated pairs can’t be separated for long or their health diminishes, so they’re always stationed together. Always. Which means—oh gods.

“As it should be,” Tairn grumbles. “Humans have no say in the laws of dragons.”

“They’re accommodations for me. I’ve seen your memories. I’m not about to have you sticking daggers into my leg to climb up. Now let’s go.”

“Isn’t that what you said to me? Is this who you really are at your core? Someone so enamored with rules that he doesn’t know when to bend or break them for someone he cares about? Someone so focused on the least I’m capable of doing, he can’t believe I can do so much more?”

“I’ve heard everything I need to hear.” Xaden’s fingers curl around the hilt. “She should have killed you in the field, but she’s merciful. That’s not a flaw I possess.”

“I let someone live once, and he almost killed you last night, Silver One,” Tairn says. Then, as if this is all that really matters in the end, “Justice is not always merciful.”

“I know you just want to keep me safe, Dain,” I whisper. “But keeping me safe is keeping me from growing, too.”

At my core, Dain, I’m a rider. Tairn knew it. Andarna knew it. It’s why they chose me. And until you can stop looking for ways to keep me in a glass cage, we aren’t going to get past this, no matter how many years of friendship we have between us.”

“I needed to change in order to survive. He wouldn’t let me.” It was the simplest explanation for the last nine months.

“Quit telling Sgaeyl about my sleep habits,” I grumble at Tairn. “I’m not dignifying that demand with a response.” “Andarna is my favorite.” Tairn snorts.

There’s nowhere in existence you could go that I wouldn’t find you, Violence.”

And when others are quick to stand in front of me, Xaden always stands at my side, trusting me to hold my own.

We can live as cowards or die as riders.

“We’re riders,” Imogen says as another explosion sounds. “We defend the defenseless. That’s what we do.”