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“Breakfast,” Carr answers. “With all the wielding you’re about to do, you’re going to need it.” He climbs onto his Orange Daggertail and, after I mount Tairn and strap in, we’re airborne.
“Because Aetos will be useful to them as long as they can keep him under their control.” Tairn blasts a puff of steam over my head, and the Orange Daggertail backs up even more. “His power is also limited to touch, so more controllable.”
There’s nowhere in existence you could go that I wouldn’t find you, Violence.”
July first, the anniversary of the Battle of Aretia, is hereby proclaimed Reunification Day and will be celebrated throughout Navarre on this date every year to honor the lives lost during the war to save our kingdom from separatists and those saved by the Treaty of Aretia. —Royal Proclamation of King Tauri the Wise
“I just wanted—” he starts, then pauses, surveying the wreckage of my room from last night. “Somehow I’d convinced myself today that we hadn’t done that much damage, but…” “Yeah, it’s…” He looks at me, and we both crack a smile.
As for the 107 innocents, the children of the executed officers, they now carry what shall be known as the rebellion relic, transferred by the dragon who carried out the king’s justice. And to show the mercy of our great king, they will all be conscripted into the prestigious Riders Quadrant at Basgiath, so they may prove their loyalty to our kingdom with their service or with their death. —Addendum 4.2, the Treaty of Aretia
The last time I stood here, I was terrified, but the distance to the ground isn’t what has my pulse pounding now. There’s more than one way to fall. Shit. That ache in my chest burns brighter than the power coursing through my veins. I’m in love with Xaden.
There’s only you, Violence.
“I’ve wanted you from the first second I saw you, Violence,” he admits.
I lean in and brush my lips over his. “Because I think I’m in love with you.” My heart beats erratically, and panic claws up my rib cage. I shouldn’t have said it. His eyes flare wide and his arms tighten around me. “You think? Or you know?”
“Oh gods.” “Which one are you calling out for?” he asks against my flesh. “Because it’s just you and me in this room, Vi, and I don’t share.”
“Grab your flight leathers, and you’d better bring Sorrengail with you, too,” Garrick says. “We’re under attack.”
The inability to control a powerful signet is just as dangerous to a rider—and everyone in their vicinity— as never manifesting one. —Major Afendra’s Guide to the Riders Quadrant
“What are you wearing?” I ask Andarna, who struts out from under Tairn’s wing with her head held high, boasting a contraption that reminds me of a saddle but isn’t. “The wingleader had it made for me. See? It hooks to Tairn’s.”
“Him?” Dain’s eyes widen and his face flushes. “You and…him?” He shakes his head. “People talk, and I thought that’s all it was, but you…” Disappointment drops his shoulders. “Don’t go, Violet. Please. He’s going to get you killed.”
“If he’s what you choose…” He sighs. “Then I guess that has to be enough for me, doesn’t it?”
“Thank you for trusting me,”
The first known gryphon attack occurred in 1 AU (After Unification) near what is now the trading post of Resson. At the edge of the dragon-protected border, the post has always been vulnerable to attack and, over the course of the past six centuries, has changed hands no less than eleven times in what has become a never-ending war to secure our borders from our power-hungry enemies. —Navarre, an Unedited History by Colonel Lewis Markham
“I’m going to keep you,” he promises, just like he did last night. Or was it this morning? “You’re mine, Violet.” I lift my chin. “Only if you’re mine.” “I’ve been yours for longer than you could ever imagine.”
“If you have ever trusted me, Violet, I need you to do it now.”
“You’re fucking early,” he says. And my heart stops.
What?! Excuse the fuck out of me?
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
Lies are comforting. Truth is painful.”
For there, in the land beyond the shadows, were monsters that dwelled in the night and dined on the souls of children who wandered too close to the woods. —“The Wyvern’s Cry,” The Fables of the Barren
“Yeah, let’s not borrow trouble.” Xaden shoots a look sideways at me, then studies the sky.
If you think you’ll ever convince a Sorrengail to risk their neck for anyone outside their own borders, then you’re a fool. Isn’t that what the flier said at the lake? Fuck that. “Tairn?” It’s not just me going to war. “We will feast on their bones, Silver One.” Graphic, but point made.
“And now I’m a rider. Riders fight.”
Tairn puts us into position, hovering about twenty feet aboveground as Liam flies for the gryphons above us, wielding spears of ice into the injured wyvern’s throat.
What the AF?? His signet is farsight, not ice... Could all of the marked ones have a second signet?
“It’s been. My honor.” Liam’s chest rattles as his lungs struggle.
Breaking my Heart! Oh no, Liam! I'm not blubbering you are!
But it was the third brother, who commanded the sky to surrender its greatest power, who finally vanquished his jealous sibling at a great and terrible price. —“The Origin,” The Fables of the Barren
In the event that you come across a poison you do not recognize, it is best to treat with any and every antidote. Either way, the patient will die, but at least this way you would have learned something. —Major Frederick’s Modern Guide for Healers
I’m on her back, falling…because she isn’t strong enough to carry me, but she’s brave enough to fly into this battle.
Oh no!
You’re all cowards. —The last words of Fen Riorson (redacted)
What I shouldn’t have done was fought my feelings for her. I should have grabbed on to her after that first kiss the way I wanted and kept her at my side, should have let her all the way in.
I would rather lose this entire war than live without you, and if that means I have to prove myself over and over, then I’ll do it. You gave me your heart, and I’m keeping it.”
“Welcome to the revolution, Violet.”
