Fourth Wing (The Empyrean, #1)

by Rebecca Yarros

A rider without their dragon is dead.

I feel like this is elluding to atleast one dragon dying.

I’ve had exactly six months.

What happened 6 months ago?

It’s not the first time I’ve heard her curse the sickness that nearly killed her while she was pregnant with me or the library Dad made my second home once she’d been stationed here at Basgiath as an instructor and he as a scribe.

hmmm

“I doubt he wants much these days.”

Mom’s storm-wielding signet power

You’ll fall. You’ll die.

This line honestly just hit me hard. Like i read it and felt like i was going to be reading about a lot of death in the chapters to come.

“Just don’t try to channel power without being a bonded rider and red-eyed monsters won’t hide under your bed, waiting to snatch you away on their two-legged dragons to join their dark army.”

Mira’s always been more vocal about her men than I have been…about all two of them.

Who's the two???

Probably because riders have trouble obeying rules.

“There’s no such thing as cheating once you climb the turret. There’s only survival and death.”

don’t seek friendships in there, Violet. Forge alliances.”

“Plus, I’ve heard that riders are allowed to marry sooner than the other quadrants,”

The hatred in Xaden’s stare burns the side of my face like a palpable flame, and even the rain pelting my skin with each gust of wind doesn’t ease the heat—or the shiver of dread that jolts down my spine.

is it hate? is it dread?

“Violet Sorrengail,” I answer as thunder cracks above me, the sound oddly comforting. I’ve always loved the nights where storms beat against the fortress window, both illuminating and throwing shadows over the books I curled up with, though this downpour might just cost me my life.

She finds comfort in thunder and lightening…

The rain eases into a drizzle, as if it had only come to make the hardest test of my life even harder…but

Mom? is that you?

“Violet?” Strong hands catch my elbows to steady me,

Touch #1

He takes my chin between his thumb and forefinger, turning my face left and right for his inspection.

Touch #2

“I’ve heard this position is just a stepping stone for him,” Tara whispers. “He wants Sorrengail’s job, then General Melgren’s.”

Commandanf Panchek is out for power...

“Melgren’s dragon gives him the signet ability to see a battle’s outcome before it happens. There’s no beating that, and you can’t be assassinated if you know it’s coming.”

IF YOU KNOW ITS COMING.

The navy dragon seems to tilt its head at me, as if its narrowed golden eyes can see straight through me to the fear fisting my stomach and the doubt curled insidiously around my heart. I bet it can even see the wrap binding my knee. It knows I’m at a disadvantage, that I’m too small to climb its foreleg and mount, too frail to ride. Dragons always know.

The dragon blinks, which might be a sign of approval, or boredom, and looks away.

Dain steps forward and cups my face, his thumb stroking over my cheekbone in a soothing motion.

Face touch #1

“The navy-blue one who landed behind the dais yesterday?” My stomach twists. The way those golden eyes assessed me…

Sgaeyl saw something in her

I have to put my hands on the person, so I’m not a security risk.

I just put my hands on someone’s temples, and I can see what they saw. It’s…incredible.”

I was…” His cheeks flush. “Really good friends with Amber Mavis—the current wingleader for Third Wing—last year, and I’m telling you, the Codex is sacred to them.

Dain....good friends with Amber???? Peculiar.

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.

Yet everyone blames HER. Why?

“They were looking for something,” Xaden says with complete conviction. “And it wasn’t riches. That’s not a gem mining district. Which begs the question, what do we have that they want so badly?”

“It’s just another piece in the puzzle of why our constant bids for peace are rejected by the kingdom of Poromiel. What were they looking for? Why that village? Were they responsible for the collapse of the ward, or was it already faltering?

Marked ones, as I’d heard some people this morning refer to those carrying rebellion relics on their arms, blame my mother for the execution of their parents.

Just having a thought: what if she "disagreed" with the kids WATCHING so that she could hide them since she was seemingly "in charge of" the executions??????

My brother, Brennan, was a mender—and would have become one of the greatest had he lived.

you certainly shouldn’t have to suffer for the honor of your mother. General Sorrengail saved Navarre by capturing the Great Betrayer.”

You’re a Sorrengail, so you will survive. Perhaps not as spectacularly as I have, but we all can’t live up to my standards, can we?

Slowly, carefully, quietly, I move out of the patchy moonlight to the next branch over, cloaking myself in shadow.

Cloaking myself in SHADOW.

It’s obviously a meeting of some sort, and I feel like a cat clinging to the leaf-tipped limbs of this tree while the wolves circle below.

I just dont think itd be a coincidence they met under the exact tree shed be climbing...

Or maybe marked ones are plotting to burn Basgiath to the ground and finish what their parents started.

Keeping myself on the opposite side of the trunk and sticking to the shadows that wrap around me, I climb down another branch with sloth-like speed, holding my breath as I test each branch with a fraction of my weight before lowering myself.

shadows that wrap around me...

“You learn what they teach you,” Xaden says to the first-year, his voice taking a hard edge. “Keep what you know but recite whatever they tell you to.”

The only things we’re asked to recite are recent events and general knowledge of what’s going on near the front lines.

“Your signet is a shadow wielder?” No wonder he’s risen so high in rank. Shadow wielders are

incredibly rare and highly coveted in battle, able to disorient entire drifts of gryphons, if not take them down, depending upon the signet’s strength.

He’s like one of those poisonous flowers I’ve read about from the Cygnis forests to the east.

He looks at me like he’s trying to see through me, and ice prickles my scalp.

Well, except Dain. He cares about every rule.

to no end, really

By code, I should tell Dain about seeing marked ones under the oak tree, but I won’t, not because I told Xaden that I wouldn’t but because keeping the secret feels like the right thing to do.

Attacks at the eastern borders are increasing, according to every Battle Brief, and yet there are fewer dragons willing to bond in order to defend Navarre.

She even bonded the relative of one of her previous riders, which you all know is typically forbidden, but Sgaeyl does whatever she wants, whenever she wants.

There’s no such thing as outsmarting a black dragon. This one is a little over a hundred, which makes him about middle-aged. He’s revered as a battle dragon among their kind, and if not for him, we probably would have lost during the Tyrrish rebellion. Add to it that he’s a morningstartail, and he’s one of the deadliest dragons in Navarre.”

Now, there is only one other black dragon, which is in service—” “General Melgren’s,”

Are they related???

“He attempted to use that power to revive a fallen rider—which didn’t work, because there’s no signet capable of resurrection—and depleted himself in the process. To use a phrase you’ll become accustomed to after Threshing, he burned out and died next to that rider.”