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fascination. Xaden had taken a step. Right before Tairn landed, he’d moved…toward me.
“Tairn’s bonds are so powerful, both to mate and rider, because he’s so powerful. Losing his last rider nearly killed him, which, in turn, nearly killed Sgaeyl. Mated pairs’ lives are—”
“Each time a dragon chooses a rider, that bond is stronger than the last, which means that if you die, Violence, it sets off a chain of events that potentially ends with me dying, too.”
“Tell me it’s going to be all right,” I murmur toward Andarna and Tairn. “It is how it should be,” Tairn answers, his voice gruff and bored at the same time. “You didn’t answer before.” Fine, it sounds a little accusatory. “Humans can’t know what’s said within the Empyrean,” Andarna answers. “It’s a rule.”
Other riders are caught up in embraces. “You’ll like it,” Tairn promises. “It’s unique.”
Suddenly, my vision isn’t mine. 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 was told last night that all the less desirable duties were being handed off to the unbonded so our energy can be redirected for flight lessons.”
We’re the squad to have the most surviving members since Parapet, this year’s Iron Squad.
I stare at the sausage. Imogen hates me just as much as Oren does. Hell, she’s the one who broke my arm and ripped out my shoulder on assessment day. “You can trust her,” Tairn says, and I startle, dropping the orange. “She hates me.” “Stop arguing with me and eat something.” There’s zero room for debate in his tone.
“And since when do you care about my survival?” This isn’t a squad thing. It can’t be. Not when she didn’t give a shit before.
Honestly, if I had those teeth bared at me, I’d back away, too. “No you wouldn’t, because you didn’t. You stayed and defended Andarna.”
“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.”
“You can’t hold me here the entire time, you know.” “Watch me. Unless you’d rather be scraped off the glacier below like Gleann’s rider back there?”
“I have to be able to do this by myself. We both need me to do this,” I argue. “Stubborn silver human,” Tairn mutters, following Kaori into a dive. I fall again. And again. And again.
It shouldn’t matter that the only reason he isn’t pursuing me is rank, and it honestly doesn’t. But it definitely makes me lose a little respect for him, which is something I never expected.
I sign, “Jesinia!” “Cadet Sorrengail,” she signs back.
After all, how could we know how earnest the scribes are about their work, how dedicated they remain, if they were to crack a smile?
the gentle nudges from Andarna to keep going when I thought my muscles might give out during Imogen’s training sessions,
No doubt they were written as a parable to warn us of the dangers of bonding dragons, but in Navarre’s six-hundred-year history of unification, I’ve never read of a single rider losing their soul to their powers. The dragons keep us from that.
searching for a face I know I can’t find—searching for my father.
“It’s hard to love a second home as much as the first.”
Our Archives have either a copy or the original of almost every book in Navarre. Only ultrarare or forbidden tomes are excluded.
Though, come to think of it, I never came across anything like The Fables of the Barren on the shelves while I was studying to become a scribe. Chimera? Yes. Kraken? Sure. But wyvern or the venin that create them? None. Bizarre.
There’s always an upperclassman somewhere near when I’m walking the halls or headed to the gym at night. And they all have rebellion relics.
“I never get to see her,” I blatantly whine. “I’m always stuck with your grumpy ass.” “I’m always here,” Andarna answers, but there’s no flicker of gold.
“And I could call you Violence like the wingleader.”
“Tell him if he harms you, I’ll scorch the ground where he stands.” “Oh, for fuck’s sake, Tairn.” I roll
“Why didn’t you tell me you can’t keep your fucking seat?” he shouts at me, grabbing my elbow.
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?”
“The reason we’ll never be anything more than friends isn’t because of your rules. It’s because you have no faith in me. Even now, when I’ve survived against all odds and bonded not just one dragon but two, you still think I won’t make it. So forgive me, but you’re about to be some of the bullshit that this place cuts away from me.”
A shadow moves to my left, and a glance tells me Xaden has moved, casually putting himself just ahead of me.
“You!” Jeremiah spins, pointing his finger at the third-year. “You think I’ve lost it!” His head tilts, and his eyes flare. “How does he know? He shouldn’t know!” His tone shifts, like the words aren’t his own.
“Is Violet going to hate me forever? Why can’t she see that I just want to keep her alive? How is he…? He’s reading my thoughts!” The impression is uncanny, embarrassing, and terrifying.
Jeremiah’s signet power is manifesting. He can read minds—an inntinnsic. His power is a death sentence.
“And you!” Jeremiah turns, his gaze locking on Garrick. “Damn it all to hell. He’ll know about—” The shadows around Jeremiah’s feet snake up his legs in a heartbeat, winding around his chest until they cover his mouth in bands of black.
The professor grips Jeremiah’s head with both hands, and a crack echoes off the walls of the silent courtyard. Xaden’s shadows melt away and Jeremiah falls to the ground, his head at an unnatural, macabre angle. His neck is broken.
“Remember that firsthand accounts are always more accurate, but you have to look deeper, Violet. You have to see who is telling the story.”
“And it’s for the best. 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.” “Wake before you die!” The bookshelves in the Archives tremble, and my heart jolts. “Now!”
“He’s almost there!” Tairn promises, panic lacing his tone.
Xaden fills the doorway like some kind of dark, avenging angel, the messenger of the queen of the gods. He’s fully dressed, his face a mask of veritable rage as shadows curl from the walls on either side of him, hanging in midair. For the first time since crossing the parapet, I’m so fucking relieved to see him that I could cry. Andarna gasps in my mind—and chaos resumes.
“She should have killed you in the field, but she’s merciful. That’s not a flaw I possess.”
should have killed him slower.” “I’m fine.” I’m not. His focus snaps back to my eyes. “Never lie to me.”
They’re all…dressed. Fully clothed at—I glance at the clock—two a.m.
can’t help but notice they all have rebellion relics shimmering up their arms, but I keep the observation to myself.
His jaw flexes once, and something that reminds me of raw hunger flitters across his expression before he locks it down, drawing my hair over my shoulder with surprising gentleness.
“I’m freakishly flexible. It’s part of the whole bones-snapping, joints-tearing thing,” I answer over my shoulder.
he drops to his knees on the floor before me.
He wraps my cloak around my shoulders and buttons it at my collar like I’m something precious.
Not that I wouldn’t climb the man like a tree if presented with the right set of circumstances.
“None of your business what I choose or do not choose to channel toward my rider,” Tairn answers with a growl. This is going well. “He says—” I start. “I heard him,” Xaden counters, not sparing me a glance.
