Fourth Wing (The Empyrean, #1)

by Rebecca Yarros

I don’t need the prohibited power of mind reading to know exactly what she sees.

👀 second signet foreshadowing????

“Violet Sorrengail,” I answer as thunder cracks above me, the sound oddly comforting.

The navy dragon seems to tilt its head at me, as if its narrowed golden eyes can see straight through me

She knowssss

Knowing I am in direct disagreement with General Melgren’s orders, I am officially objecting to the plan set forth in today’s briefing. It is not this general’s opinion that the children of the rebellion’s leaders should be forced to witness their parents’ executions. No child should watch their parent put to death. —The Tyrrish Rebellion, an official brief for King Tauri by General Lilith Sorrengail

So she’s good? 🤔

Dain squeezes my hand gently.

Baaaarffff

what can you tell me about black dragons?” “They’re the smartest and most discerning,” Aurelie calls out. “They’re the rarest,” I add in. “There hasn’t been one born in the last…century.” “Correct.” Professor Kaori spins the illusion again, and I’m met with a pair of glaring yellow eyes. “They’re also the most cunning. There’s no such thing as outsmarting a black dragon.

So Codagh knew what he was doing 👀

My heart does that damn stuttering thing again, as if he’d sent shadows straight through my ribs to squeeze the organ. He lifts his scarred brow, and I swear there’s a hint of a smile on his lips as he leaves,

He can totally hear her thoughts!!!!

Orange dragons, coming in various shades of apricot to carrot, are the most—I throw myself to the next rail—unpredictable of dragonkind and therefore always a risk.

Brennan……..

after my mom had a really long night while we were stationed near the eastern border, and her eyes were bloodshot red,

👀👀👀

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

“Stay close to the wingleader until we return,” Tairn orders.

Stay with the high lord 🖤

I’m looking at my own back through…Andarna’s eyes. A back that has a glistening black relic of a dragon mid-flight stretching from shoulder to shoulder and, in the center, the silhouette of a shimmering golden one.

I swear that’s her second signet.

Your mother has never understood that while riders may be the weapons of our kingdom, it’s the scribes who have all the real power in this world.”

In response to the Great War, dragons claimed the western lands and gryphons the central ones, abandoning the Barrens and the memory of General Daramor, who nearly destroyed the Continent with his army. Our allies sailed home and we began a period of peace and prosperity as the provinces of Navarre united for the first time behind the safety of our wards, under the protection of the first bonded riders. —Navarre, an Unedited History by Colonel Lewis Markham

“Unedited history” my ass

I’m alive. I’m alive. I’m alive. I repeat the mantra in my head as Xaden wipes the blood from my dagger on the back of Oren’s tunic. “Yes. You’re alive.” Xaden steps over Oren’s body and two others, retrieving my dagger from the fallen woman’s shoulder before reaching my armoire. I don’t even recognize her, and yet she tried to kill me. Garrick and Bodhi haul out the first bodies. “I didn’t realize I’d said that out loud.” The trembling starts in my knees, and then nausea overpowers me.

He heard her thoughts!!! 😤

Xaden’s dark gaze cuts through me like a knife for a millisecond before he glares back at Tairn. “Do not dare to try and read me, human, or you’ll regret it.”

Taken knows Xaden can read thoughts!!!

“Feathertails shouldn’t bond because they can accidentally gift their powers to humans,” Andarna continues. “Dragons can’t channel—not really—until we’re big, but we’re all born with something special.”

“A signet is a combination of our power with your own ability to channel. It reflects who you are at the core of your being.”

“Violence,” he moans, and the sound of the nickname on his lips makes me ravenous. Closer. I need him closer. As though he can hear my thoughts, he kisses me harder,

Because he can hear your thoughts!!!!

Violet, he’s not the most powerful rider of our generation. You are.”

He is not the sun, you are. - Dr. Christina Yang

“I’ll agree that keeping my distance didn’t work out so well, and if today’s little stunt was about getting my attention, then congratulations.

Ok, Dumbledore.

Eventually those closest to us become our enemies in some way, even if it’s through well-intentioned love or apathy, or if we live long enough to become their villains. —Page eighty, the Book of Brennan

👀👀👀😭

the power rises to a breaking point and the roof of my Archives disintegrates. Power crackles above me, swirls around me, wraps along my feet below me. I am the sky and the power of every storm that has ever been. I am infinite.

you are the best hope the kingdom has against the hordes of evil that seek to harm it.

👀

Power blazes beneath my skin again, buzzing in wordless, frenzied demand.

Interesting that she always only refers to her own power as “Power” and not “magic”

“And considering he’s the most powerful of them in the quadrant at the moment—” “But not the Continent,” Tairn admits.

So who is?! 👀

wind makes his white hair dance

“Because knowledge is power. As a general’s daughter, you should know that. We can’t have someone walking around with unfettered access to classified material. They’re a security risk to the entire kingdom.” And yet Dain is living. “Because Aetos will be useful to them as long as they can keep him under their control.”

There’s nowhere in existence you could go that I wouldn’t find you, Violence.” The promise should be a threat, but it’s not. It’s too damned comforting for that.

This could be a problem once he turns bad.

Images of…me flood my mind. It’s last night, except I’m somehow seeing it through Xaden’s eyes, feeling the unmistakable burn of insatiable desire. My control slips—no, it’s Xaden’s control slipping as I moan beneath him, my hips riding his hand, my nails biting into his skin with a pain that borders on pleasure as I writhe. Gods, I need—no—he needs me.

I swear her second signet is seeing through other ppl’s eyes.

dated just a few months before his death. My Violet, By the time you find this, you’ll most likely be in the Scribe Quadrant. Remember that folklore is passed from one generation to the next to teach us about our past. If we lose it, we lose the links to our past. It only takes one desperate generation to change history—even erase it. I know you’ll make the right choice when the time comes. You have always been the best of both your mother and me.

I throw the aggravating man out.

Amen sis.

His touch is gentle when he cups my cheek. “You look beautiful tonight, Vi.”

STOP LETTING HIM TOUCH YOUR FACE EW.

And to show the mercy of our great king, they will all be conscripted into the prestigious Riders Quadrant at Basgiath,

This makes no absolute sense to me. You are criminals, welcome to Harvard.

forward, taking me even deeper. I’m not going to survive this. I’m going to die right here in this bed. “Then I’m going to die with you,” he promises, kissing me. I’m so far gone, I didn’t even realize I said the words out loud, and then I remember that I don’t have to. “More. I need more.” Power simmers beneath my skin and my legs lock.

Because you didn’t sis! He can hear your thoughts!!!

In his last days of interrogation, Fen Riorson lost touch with reality, railing against the kingdom of Navarre. He accused King Tauri, and all who came before him, of a conspiracy so vast, so unspeakable, that it does not bear repeating by this historian. The execution was swift and merciful for a madman who cost untold lives. —Navarre, an Unedited History by Colonel Lewis Markham

So obviously Markham lies and is bad.

“Dragons are bound by bonds,” he explains as Xaden approaches. “There is only one other bond more sacred than that of a dragon and its rider.” A dragon and its mate.

Tairn and Sgeyl come before Xaden and that’s final 😤

“I know what you’re thinking,” Xaden says

WE KNOW YOU KNOW

Dad didn’t just give me a rare book…but a forbidden one.

I gave him everything, and he never truly let me in. Pain rips through my chest

You’re stupid

sputter. “I would know if he read my memories.” Xaden’s face falls, and his hand slips downward, cradling the back of my neck. “No, Violence. Trust me, you wouldn’t.”

Liam flies for the gryphons above us, wielding spears of ice into the injured wyvern’s throat.

“Such untapped power. No wonder we were called here. You could command the sky to surrender all its power, and I bet you don’t know what to do with it, do you? Riders never do. I’m going to split you open and see where all that astonishing lightning comes from.” She waves the other dagger at me, and I realize she’s playing with me. “Or maybe I’ll let him do it. You’ll wish for death if I hand you over to my Sage.”

“Violet?” I keep my shields up, trying to respect her privacy as I walk to her side, but gods, I need to know what she’s thinking.

HE CAN CONTROL HIS MIND READING

“It’s not even that you kept this from me. I get it. It’s the ease with which you did it. The ease with which I let you into my heart and didn’t get the same in return.”

Dude he fucking told you that there’s lots you don’t know about him and you literally said “I know enough”. Stfu.

“I gave you my trust for free once, and once is all you get.”

OK BUT DAIN GOT THIRTY CHANCES?!?