Reading Time: 126 Minutes
Title: Change of Plans
Author: DarkJediQueen
Fandom: The Empyrean
Genre: Fantasy, First Time, Het, Hurt/Comfort
Relationship(s): Violet Sorrengail/Xaden Riorson
Content Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Torture, Violence-Graphic, Abuse, Burning, Brutal Injuries, Death, Explicit Sex, Murder, Poisoning, War
Alpha: V.Mures
Word Count: 57,968
Summary: Xaden Riorson knew he probably wouldn’t be seen as the good guy at the end of this, but he was okay with that. He had plans for General Sorrengail’s daughter right up until he was asked to fill the favor he owed the General. Those plans changed from something fast to something slow and methodical. He just didn’t plan on having his heart in it.
Artist: penumbria
Chapter One
Xaden Riorson had never regretted the favor that he owed to Lilith Sorrengail. It gave the other hidden rebels a chance at a life that could mean something. The Riders Quadrant would be hard for most of them, but he hoped that by the time the bulk of them were old enough to go that far, He would have done something to make it where they didn’t have to.
Basgiath wasn’t going to be the death of him. He wouldn’t let it best him like it had bested his grandfather. He would use his time there to make sure that he was as set up for his plans as possible.
It wasn’t an open rebellion like his father had done since that stupid with what they had at their disposal. No, it was going to be quiet and slow. He was going to take his time and act like the doting dog who would lick the heels of its master. He would make sure that no one questioned him.
“Why does General Sorrengail want you?” Garrick asked as he set himself up on the wall beside Xaden. Garrick Tavis had been his friend for a long time and was one of the few people who knew him better than anyone else. The others were Liam Mairi, who would be joining them this year, and Bodhi Durran, Xaden’s cousin. He wasn’t sure what would happen with all of them now that they would be there together. There were, of course, the others to deal with as well. More children of the rebellion would be arriving that year, and Xaden knew that tensions would be high. It was going to be interesting to get them spread out.
There was also the rumor that Sorrengail’s daughter was going to Basgiath this year. She was a scribe at heart and had followed in her father’s footsteps, but there was the softer rumor that she would try her hands at the Rider’s Quadrant.
“I am not sure,” Xaden said. It wasn’t too hard to put the two pieces together and understand what would be happening.
“Acting stupid doesn’t make you,” Garrick said.
“Well, I’m not acting stupid; I’m just not giving in to the rumors that have abound over this place.”
“Violet Sorrengail is coming of age to come to Basgiath and you have heard the rumors as well as I have about her joining us and not going to the scribes.”
“Hmm,” Xaden said. He turned to look at Garrick and saw Bodhi coming up behind them.
“Do not treat them like idiots,” Sgaeyl said, her voice calm in the storm. He had heard that her voice was considered harsh, but to Xaden, it was a source of comfort.
Sgaeyl was a force to be reckoned with when it came to the dragons that all of the riders at Basgiath bonded with. There was just a single one who was even more revered for their fighting, and that was her mate, Tairn. Who still hadn’t bonded a rider since the death of his first and last, Naolin, who gave his life to keep Brennan Sorrengail alive. A fact that Xaden loved that he kept from Sorrengail. No one knew that Brennan was alive except for a few who were trusted in Aretia. He had a name that kept him safe.
“I’m not. I just don’t jump at every single rumor that abounds.”
“You are not stupid either. Do not treat me that way.”
Xaden laughed and looked back at Bodhi before waiting for his cousin to come over and sit beside him.
“When do you meet with her?”
“Dusk. I plan to be there early, just to be safe. Conscription Day is coming up fast, and if it’s what I think it’s going to be, I will have to make sure to be the best asshole I can be.”
“What are you talking about?” Bodhia asked.
“Rumor is that Violet Sorrengail is coming here, not to the scribes,” Garrick said.
“Impossible. Just fucking impossible. I’ve seen her. She’s not anything close to someone who could survive here.”
“Ah, I agree on that, but it’s Lilith Sorrengail, and she has a legacy. That legacy isn’t served by having only Mira be some badass dragon rider. Brennan was a martyr for the cause, but in the end, he’s inconsequential when it comes to legacy, and we all know how much of a bitch Sorrengail is,” Xaden said.
“You really think that she will force her daughter through to what? Kill her?”
“Rider or death,” Xaden said to Bodhi’s words.
“I’ve heard that she’s been seen training with a guy from infantry over in the administration side of the college. I heard that about an hour ago. Brown hair with the silver tips of hair. It’s not like it’s hard to know that she’s the only person with hair like that.”
Xaden nodded. He looked toward that part of the college and tried to think about what he would do when Sorregnail asked him to do whatever She wanted him to do with her child.
“I wondered for a long time what she was going to call in her favor, and it’s going to be hard to do anything to keep her alive.”
“Agreed, but what else can you do about it? It’s what it is,” Garrick said.
“She would be a powerful ally,” Sgaeyl said.
“How? She’s weak, and it will be hard for her to live through this. She would need…” Xaden turned that thought over in his head. He would have to do a lot of work to make sure that she didn’t die if that was what was asked of her.
“When does Liam arrive?”
“The day before,” Bodhi said.
“Good. Get Imogen and all of us to meet in your room, Garrick, after I meet with Sorrengail. We can discuss what we are going to do. I’m going to go flying until it’s time to meet with her. I’m going to stay in flight leathers when I do it as well.”
“Is it wise to push her like that?” Garrick asked.
“No, but it’s fun. I will never let her forget I am my father’s son.” Xaden stood up, jumping off the wall instead of slipping off it. He headed to where Sgaeyl would pick him up because he also wanted to fly. He closed up his jacket and thought about his plans. There was going to be a lot that could come of this if he just made sure that he pulled Violet along with him as much as possible.
Violet Sorrengail would be ripe for the picking, and her mother would ask him to protect her, making sure it wasn’t that strange to see them together. He would make the woman regret her entire life from the moment she put her daughter on his radar.
—
Xaden was standing at parade rest outside of General Sorrengail’s office when he came up after dinner, which had run long and was past dusk. It was a game that she wanted to play since she knew the moment that they arrived because there was no way that word hadn’t gotten to her.
“Riorson,” Sorrewngail said.
“General,” Xaden said, bowing his head toward her in deference. It was the only thing he had ever done for her.
“Follow me,” she said.
Xaden wasn’t shocked that they didn’t go into her office. There was a small room that was used for meetings across the hall, and it was where they went. Xaden opened himself up a little, feeling Sgaeyl as she got closer to them, just in case this was something that was going to end in his death at her hands. Sgaeyl didn’t trust her, and Xaden didn’t either. He wasn’t sure which one of them mistrusted her more.
There was just a feeling of determination from her, and Xaden didn’t want to go into it too much about what she could be feeling that way. It was easy to get lost in people’s intentions and the way that they felt, which could make it easier for someone to realize what he was doing. It was a fine line that he needed to walk.
“What are your plans as Wingleader for the coming year?”
“To make this one of the best groups to come out of Basgiath in years.” Xaden knew she didn’t care beyond the fact that there were dragon riders who were alive to fight the war that they were being lied to about.
The venin weren’t going to wait, and they were getting closer while the Navarrian leadership was going to act like it wasn’t happening until they could not hide it anymore.
Unlike the king, Xaden knew that once the people knew what was going on, there would be an outcry about how this was something that had been kept from them for as long as it had. There were folklore tales that parents used to scare children into acting right and being moral little shit, but in the end, it was tales told. It wasn’t facts. There was no study for the first war between the dragons, gryphons, and humans versus the venin and their wyvern. They were all learning the wrong thing to fight the war that was really coming, and it was Xaden’s biggest point of anger.
Basgiath was creating fodder for a war that didn’t matter to keep the real war hidden from its people.
“Violet will be joining the riders, not the scribes, as most have thought.”
“As a Sorregail should,” Xaden said.
Sorrengail sat down at the large table and waved for Xaden to do the same. Xaden picked his seat with care, wanting to make sure that she was far enough away that if she wanted to kill him, she wouldn’t have an easy time of it. He sat down and waved off the glass of water that was offered to him. He wasn’t that stupid. That pitcher had been sitting out when he got there, and the glass for her had already been filled up as well.
Sorrengail sipped at her water and then turned her entire focus to him. “Violet is an idealistic child. I tried to get that out of her, but she’s as much her father as she is me. I want to make sure that she lives because she will trust the wrong people.”
“She should be trusting no one,” Xaden said.
“As my daughter, this is correct. There are those that would think that you and yours would be the biggest threat against her.”
Xaden realized what she was aiming for. Sorrengail had played the long game with the bargain between them. The biggest threat to Violet was indeed the children of the rebellion because of what Sorrengail had done to their parents.
“What exactly do you want from me?” Xaden asked.
“I want my daughter to live, but I know that there are things that not even you can do to make sure that she lives, so to finish out our bargain, I want you to make sure that she lives. Her own naivete can’t be helped, so I do not expect you to fight against it. Challenges you cannot do anything about as well. Parapet is its own challenge. She’s going to have to do those things on her own, but outside of those three things, you make sure that she lives, or your own life will be forfeit.”
“I cannot do anything about Threshing.”
“Bodies are not checked to see what kills them, and we never check. Threshing is its own issue, but you will make sure that no one kills her there either, outside of dragons.”
“What if she does something even more stupid, like try to run from the riders?”
“I’ll make sure that she doesn’t and that she knows that I will put her back where she belongs.”
Xaden knew that there were many who felt the same about the bargain that Xaden had gotten for them, but on the other side, it was death or just never doing anything at all. There was no way forward for them after their parents had died in the rebellion that failed. It allowed Xaden to move them around, but they were trapped in the Riders Quadrant. They were trapped where they were, and it was a place where it was supposed to be volunteers. Violet would feel that tight pulling as well. It would make her resent her mother even more than she already did.
Plans with more plans inside them started to form in Xaden’s head, and he wondered what kind of person Violet was at the base herself. It was going to be interesting to see what she was like. There was so much that he could do with her. None of it would be considered a good thing, but he figured that if he lured her in with the truth, things would be better for him.
What better way to hurt Lilith Sorrengail than to go after her daughter and turn her daughter against her using the truth? There was so much he could do with that, and he wanted to keep it going the way he needed to. There was a lot to think about that he needed to do. There wasn’t a lot of time before Violet came, and he needed to see her.
With Conscription Day approaching, Xaden would need to make sure that he got as much time to watch her as he could. He would spend a lot of time watching instead of doing what else he needed. That would fall to Bodhi and Garrick, who would be fine doing it.
“Do you agree?” Sorrengail asked.
“Do I have a choice?”
“Well, you do, but you wouldn’t like the outcome.”
“I’ll make sure that no one kills her outside of challenges, Parapet, and her own naivete.” Xaden knew what was to come next with the whole mark on him. He wore them like a badge of honor. She thought she was making him regret using a Tyrrish custom against him, but he found that it showed others what kind of person he was.
Lilith Sorrengail could not do anything to make him feel ashamed of who he was, where he came from, or where he was going.
—
“What happened?” Garrick asked.
“Well, Violet Sorrengail is being put into the viper’s nest. Her mother either has a plan that none of us can figure out, or she wants her youngest child dead.”
“What?” Imogen asked.
“Her mother is forcing her to join the quadrant. She’s not going to the scribes. I’ve been tasked with keeping her alive outside of challenges and her own naivete if she makes it across the Parapet.”
“What?” Imogen stood up.
Xaden looked at her, and she sat down again, scowling at him. He raised an eyebrow, and she stopped.
“Violet’s under our protection now.”
“Xaden,” Bodhi said.
“No, I have thought of the best way to do what we want to do.”
“How the fuck would that help us?” Imogen demanded.
“Because what better way than to fuck with General Lilith Sorrengail than to turn her daughter to our side? Make her know that she did this by asking me to protect her. To make sure that she doesn’t die. Think about it. She will have to watch me pull her daughter in slowly with the truth of everything.”
“Everything?” Garrick asked.
“Everything.”
“And what does Sgaeyl think about this?” Bodhi asked.
“She agreed. She’s just as ruthless as I am. Think about it. She’s isolated, and we can use that. Make friends with her. Make her understand what we are going through. She’s forced through here just as much as we are. I can make sure that I meet her before she crosses, and when she makes it across, we can start everything.”
“Except here is the roadblock: her sister and best friend,” Garrick asked.
“Best friend?” Xaden asked. He knew it had to be someone in the quadrant, or Garrick wouldn’t worry about him.
“Dain Aetos.” Garrick grinned after saying it. “But there is also the fact that I heard he broke things off with Amber Mavis just two hours ago. Rumor is that there is something between Dain and Violet. That there was something there before, but he didn’t act on it.”
“That asshole is too much of a rule follower to even touch her with being above her in years. He might be ditching Amber for another reason,” Bodhi said.
“Agreed,” Xaden said, but he could see where Aetos might have done something else to ensure that Violet was his—keeping her from anyone else until they could do something about it. Aetos wouldn’t let her do it if it meant breaking or even bending a rule. He was a stickler, and it was more than being the son of Sorrengail’s aide. There was a lot there between them.
“Find out more about that. I want to know it all. I’ll work on finding where she practices and see what we have going on there. I want people to help her. We will see what kind of person she is and then work on making sure that she’s away from her mother.”
“Two of her three children turning traitor is better than killing Violet,” Garrick said.
“She…” Imogen stopped, sighed. “I get it, and I hate her, but I also see what you mean.”
“We are all being subjected to this for the sins of our parents, Imogen,” Bodhi said.
“And we hate it, but we are doing what we can. That’s our in,” Xaden said.
Sgaeyl purred affection for what Xaden was doing in his head. He knew she was also very into making sure that the newest version of the rebellion survived. It would be an interesting time to make sure that Violet got everything she needed without Xaden getting too close.
Violet was going to be a means to an end. There was nothing that was going to stop him from getting what he wanted out of her and then discarding her once she wasn’t something that was useful. There was no reason to keep her around for anything.
—
Xaden settled in the grass and looked up at the sky with Sgaeyl sunning herself beside him. Tairn was off to the side, wanting to be out of the Vale and with his mate. Xaden was still in awe of the size of him. He had seen the dragon from time to time but never this close. Usually, it was when they split off, and Tairn went back to the Vale while Sgaeyl came to him for training.
“Do you think that you can pull it off?” Sgaeyl asked.
“I know that I can. She’s been sheltered and knows books more than she knows anything else. She’s not going to know what hit her when she’s got people around her who want to help her live through the hellish place that her mother put her.”
“And if she’s not what you think?”
“Then I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.”
Xaden knew that his plans hinged on someone he had no idea who they were. He knew she was smart. Brennan talks about her sometimes, but not enough for Xaden to really know her. He couldn’t hinge things on the fact that she was going to go along with this. He wasn’t even sure she would be friendly to him, even if he were friendly to her.
“You could seduce her at the same time. I doubt she’s had much love, even if Aetos was sweet on her.”
Xaden snorted. He wasn’t sure what would come of that way, but he could do it. He knew what he looked like and what it was like to be chased. He thought about Cat and everything to do with her. He wasn’t sure it was a good path, but it wasn’t like he was looking for love. Seduction was a tool he could use, but he needed to make sure that he was not going to hurt her in the long run beyond upending her entire life. He was ruthless, but there were lines he didn’t want to cross. That kind of manipulation was something that he couldn’t do. It was a line he couldn’t cross even if he thought he would never find one.
When it came to his people, to the people of the continent, and all of them, he thought that he would have killed his own father to make them safe, but he found that he had lines.
“Tairn wants you to know that you stink,” Sgaeyl said a few minutes later, right before Tairn took flight and headed back to the Vale.
The sky was starting to get dark, it was a summer storm creeping up on them, or it was Sorrengail fucking around with her signet. Xaden wasn’t even sure which it was because even with being here, she needed to keep her signet powerful. There was so much that they could end up doing that would make it easy to forget how to use it.
Xaden didn’t think that it was ever going to happen to him, but he also knew that right now, he wasn’t one ever to retire like some did. There were those who were considered too valuable to let them retire, like Nolan. There were those who had signets that weren’t good for combat at all. Those were allowed to retire, or when the rider got to the point of being too old, if one had made it that far.
Garrick’s arrival wasn’t hard to miss. Xaden could feel his intentions as he got closer. Garrick wanted to talk to him about something.
Before Garrick got too close, Sgaeyl took off, an illusion of privacy that Xaden wasn’t sure worked at all for them. It wasn’t like Garrick didn’t know how much Sgaeyl got from Xaden, and it wasn’t like any of them kept much from their dragons. It was something that was different about them than others from what Xaden had been able to figure out.
“Yes?” Xaden asked as Garrick sat down beside him.
“I wanted to talk about what you plan on doing…can you trust her if you turn her against her mother?”
“I can’t say how it’s going to go, but in the end, her mother will only have two choices: let her live and go with us or kill her. If we are right about the rumors of her loving her children, I can’t see her killing her. The only thing that we will be doing is making sure that her mother regrets her entire life.”
“Is it worth doing that to her?”
“I can’t answer that, but I know that her mother wants me to protect her. To make sure that she lives. That also means that she needs something to live for.”
Garrick said nothing for a few minutes, picking at the grass they were sitting on. “Revenge is all well and good, but she is in the middle.”
“I understand, but you know full well what I’m going to do in the end to make sure that we can do what we can. Having someone like Violet Sorrengail on our side can only help if she lives. If a dragon bonds with her. She might be a better scribe than anything else, but in the end, that can only help us,” Xaden said. He turned to face Garrick a little better. “She’s going to be a pawn, but I’m going to make sure I don’t hurt her that much; I’m not that heartless. She’s a pawn, but to keep her, I need to make sure that I’m honest with her about everything.”
“I hear she’s pretty.”
“And?” Xaden said.
“Well, that means that we are going to have to deal with the others lusting after her. I am not sure that having her mother as her mother is going to stop that.”
Xaden understood that more than Garrick probably wanted to think about. There was a lot that would gladly go to bed with Xaden based on his looks, despite everything to do with his father. There was a reason that he hadn’t fuck first years, even when he was a first year. Sex was good, and he had everything going on with Cat that he was getting away from. He didn’t need something like that again, where someone wanted him for what he had going when it came to Tyrrendor and all of that over wanting to be with him because they wanted him.
“So we are going with being honest?”
“We might dodge the truth a little bit at first, but yes, I plan to be honest. Everyone but those in the know are being lied to. This fucking area was founded on lies, and it keeps getting bigger and bigger, riskier and riskier. It will boil over, and having Brennan and Violet on our side will work out better for us in the end. Mira will come over, I think. Then, it’s General Sorrengail versus her children. It’s going to work in our favor for that. That we have the hero of the Battle of Aretia on our side; he’s been working with us the whole time.”
Garrick made a noise that sounded a lot like agreement. “I wanted to see all our angles, and unless it’s dire, I never want to really go against you in public. She’s an unknown, and that means that we have to play things by ear. You are going to watch her, right?”
“I am. I need to get a feel for her. I also need to pay a little more attention to Aetos. See what I can figure out about him. He’s a pain in my ass, but I need to see what I think is going to happen when Violet gets here.”
“We will have to make plans to neutralize him as well, just in case. He could be the biggest thorn in our side when it comes to this all. He might be the one thing we cannot overcome,” Garrick said.
Xaden nodded and looked out into the Vale, or what he could see of it from where they were. There was not a lot, but Xaden could almost feel the power from there. The area behind Riorson House in Aretia didn’t feel anything like it. He wasn’t sure what would happen in the coming days with everything, but he was glad that Garrick was making him think of what could go wrong, the things they needed to plan for as much as possible, and everything else. There was so much going on that he wasn’t sure he had time for what he had planned, but he could make sure that he was not as involved at the start.
“The world is changing, and Navarre is not keeping up.”
“No, it’s not keeping up at all. They are stuck in the times of six hundred years ago. There was not a lot that they had done to move forward, and they can’t exactly have much in the way of contact with anyone outside of there, either.”
Navarre were isolationists who were never going to come out of their shells as long as the venin were hidden from them. There were people who would never be able to know what truly happened to their family who died because they were killed by venin or even wyvern.
“Have there been any reports of wyvern seen?” Xaden asked.
“Not that we have been told, but we also know that certain things are kept from everyone. There is not a lot of information that gets to us, just to be safe,” Garrick said. Repeating what Xaden knew already was a good reminder of what was going on with everything. There was not a lot of information that Xaden had that would compromise Aretia too much, and if there was a chance that something was going to happen, Sgaeyl and the other dragons would get them out or at least fly for Aretia to get the word that they needed to flee.
King Tauri and his people under him had written off Aretia as a threat, which was another thing that irked Xaden to no end. There was too much that was going on that anything they felt wasn’t an issue wasn’t an issue, and it was going to bite them in the ass. If it had been Xaden, he would have made sure that nothing had started to happen in Aretia. Hell, it was hard to know anything truthful because Navarre had hidden so much that Xaden didn’t trust anything that was taught about the six hundred years of history of Navarre after and even before the Unification. There was nothing to trust in there. Xaden trusted what his father knew of things, but that was about it, and even some could be wrong just by the fact of the time that it had taken and the way that oral stories were changed over retellings.
“What are you thinking about?” Garrick asked before he laid back as the sun started to set, hiding behind the mountain around them.
“History and the truth of it. Just like I always do. What are we going to learn about the past? That is something we should know, but we don’t because it was twisted into the lie that King Tauri and the people before him felt were the best stories to tell about the world. Do we have allies out there who would help, but we have no idea who they are because we have nothing of them here? Are there enemies beyond the venin out there as well? We can’t even trust a single bit of anything we are taught, but knowing it all will help when it’s time to rebuild our world. We can find people out there who have their versions of history and find the truth somewhere between the two of them.”
Garrick nodded before he tugged Xaden to lie down with him. “You really do stink.”
“Tairn said the same before he left. I was training on a few things, and I am sweaty.” Xaden plucked at his shirt a little before he looked at Garrick with a smile. “It’s not the worst we have smelled.”
“No, it’s not. Let’s head back, get cleaned up, and check on the idiots before they do something idiotic.”
“I’m not ready for the first years to arrive,” Xaden said. He groaned as he got up because he hated the first years when he was one. He knew it wasn’t fair because not everyone had gone through what he had, and even though all of them wanted to be riders, they were still so young. The new batch would be the same, and Xaden hoped he wouldn’t have to deal with the side effects of the first few deaths. As a wingleader, he should be far enough away from that.
“Let’s go,” Garrick said as he got up, laying his hand on Xaden’s shoulder and squeezing.
Xaden headed back toward the barracks, excited for Liam to arrive and hating that Liam would come with so many others.
Chapter Two
Xaden knew his way around Basgiath better than most there. He was sure that some form of security might know it better than he did, but he also knew that most would never care to know it like him. They took their job seriously, but they were also just doing a job. For Xaden, being able to move around the place might be the difference between life and death. It was the kind of thing that made him seem a lot more dangerous than he was. He wasn’t looking to destroy the school. The kids inside it weren’t the ones he had a fight with yet. They were just sheep who followed the lies that they had been fed. Of course, it was hard to get through it all when faced with nothing that rocked it.
There were a few questions here and there with some of the more idiotic people, and Xaden was able to find what he was looking for. Major Gilstead was easy to find when someone knew the name; getting the name had taken a lot. The man had been hard to find at first, but in the end, it was easy to find as well once Xaden had learned how to go about asking about him.
The little area where Gilstead waited for his charge was something that most people overlooked. It was good enough for training a small group, which was just a group of one. But in the end, it was more than enough for it. Xaden watched the girl as she trained. The man was doing it all wrong if they wanted to make sure that Violet Sorrengail survived the parapet, much less any further in the whole thing.
Xaden still thought that it was a death sentence for Sorrengail and that her mother just wanted an honorable way for the child she didn’t love to die. There was honor in dying, even when crossing the parapet. The method of death was never recorded, and it was how many assassinations had taken place over the years. Sometimes for payment and sometimes just because they wanted to. Xaden had heard whispers about that kind of thing.
Yet, if General Sorrengail wanted her youngest child dead, why did she go out of her way to make a deal with Xaden to protect her? It was a little too much that he didn’t know about it, and he wasn’t sure that he wanted to know the inner workings of her mind, not when it came to her children.
The thought of the other two always set Xaden off a little. He needed to figure out what he was going to do about that. There were a lot of ways that he could easily pull her to his side in all of this. He just had to do it the best way so she wouldn’t run off to someone else and tell them. Telling her about Brennan being alive was going to be something that he kept until she could see him in person, and that meant at least after Threshing.
Xaden watched the training and made a few notes in his head about things that he needed to have others work with her on once they started that kind of thing. Challenges would be Sorrengail’s worst thing, and while she was supposed to be smart, smarts didn’t keep much when she was at such a disadvantage. Imogen would be needed for certain weight training, and someone just needed to watch Sorrengail’s back.
“Are you even paying attention?” Gilstead demanded.
Sorrengail glared at the major, and it was a thing of beauty. He knew that being General Sorrengail’s daughter meant that she hadn’t had a walk in the park life. Xaden had heard stories of Mira and her time at Basgiath. Everyone knew things about Brennan’s time there and then the time after as well. Even the whole thing of Xaden’s father supposedly killing him. Even Xaden didn’t know all of that and how it had all come about. It had happened before he had been considered old enough to take part in anything, and he had been fostered elsewhere. The underground movement that saved Brennan’s life and hid him away also made sure that secrets were kept to stop things from happening.
Still, Brennan being alive was still a kink in Xaden’s plan.
“So this is what you do on your days off?” Garrick asked.
“I don’t have days off, and this is the first time I’ve actually found where they train.”
“So, this is her? Violet Sorrengail?”
“Yes.”
“Is she trying to get her daughter killed?”
“I’m not sure about anything, but it does seem like it, doesn’t it? I’ve seen what I need. Let’s head out. I’ll come back when I can to make sure that I know what to expect.”
“And you have your plans now?”
Xaden nodded. The plans were not the nicest, but whether everyone else knew it or not, this was war.
“Bodhi wants to talk about the plans,” Garrick said.
Xaden knew this was coming. They were part of this, no matter what. He had to trust them with it and make sure that they were part of it, or it would never work.
“I think that the first thing is going to make sure that Imogen doesn’t kill her.”
“You will have to make sure that all of the kids don’t kill her. Getting a hold of Melgren and anything to do with him is impossible. General Sorrengail’s the best target, and the youngest kid is the easier target.”
Xaden waited for Garrick to turn to leave before he did as well.
“He’s correct. You will have to make sure that they fear touching her in any way.”
Xaden knew that he would have to make sure that no one went after her in a way that would harm her. That would put a kink in his plans that he didn’t want to have to deal with.
“No plan survives engagement.”
“Thanks, Sgaeyl,” Xaden said to where Garrick could hear it.
Garrick snorted and kept on walking. They were in an area they technically weren’t supposed to be in, but it wasn’t against the Codex, so no one would really fight them on it. However, it would look suspicious, and Xaden needed to keep that down. No one was around as they made their way back to the rider’s section of Basgiath. Bodhi was waiting at the doorway to Xaden’s room with a look on his face. Bodhi had been the one to get books for them from the Archives when needed. It had been easy because there was a scribe there that Bodhi liked to flirt with, and it got them what they needed without raising suspicion. There had been a lot of talk about what else would need to be done to get them out of there alive and keep things going to make sure that the Marked Ones that were still to come into Basgiath over the years would have what they needed to get through it. They might not have had a choice about going in, but Xaden wasn’t going just to let them all die for no reason. This would at least get them a chance to make a living. Once bonded to a dragon, there was less chance of them being murdered in their sleep.
There was little for them to do once in the room but talk, but Xaden knew that his plans would not be well-liked by Bodhi or Garrick. Maybe, especially by Garrick.
“So you have been talking about and thinking about a plan of some kind. So lay it on us,” Bodhi said.
Xaden sat in the window of his room, looking out. He had made sure this place was safe, so there was no reason to think that anyone would be able to do anything. Even Sgaeyl was close by if things went badly. He laid out to both of them what General Sorrengail wanted exactly since only Garrick knew that so far.
“Wait…she wants her daughter dead?” Bodhi asked.
“That’s what I assumed as well. There is not a lot that makes sense when it comes to this beyond that. If so, why ask me to protect her? Unless she wants that leverage over me. Make me do something for her that I would never do, but I owe her for letting her daughter die when there was no chance of her surviving.”
“How small is she?” Bodhi looked at Garrick first, and Garrick was being a little too generous with how tall he was estimating she was.
“If she’s five foot one, I’ll eat one of Sgaeyl’s scales,” Xaden said.
“Okay, well, you are the one who was watching her closer than I was. I was paying attention to what she was doing overall. She’s going to fail at challenges unless someone takes her in hand.”
“And you are going to do that? To make General Sorrengail happy? Her?”
“No, not really. I don’t want to kill the child to get back at the parent. The General’s daughter is innocent, and she already lost someone, but I want to hurt Lilith the best way that I can, and that means that she’s going to lose her daughter in another way.”
“Xaden,” Garrick said.
“Look, she was supposed to join the scribes like her father. Whatever changed that for her mother, whether she wants her dead or can’t stand the thought of one of her children not being a rider, I have no clue, but both leave me open to getting Violet over to our cause.”
“You…” Bodhi sounded shocked, but then he started to grin. “You think that she’s already going to dislike her mother and hate her enough that becoming friends with her will make it easier to get her to be on our side. How much are you going to trust her with?”
“Very little at first, but then as time goes on, I’m sure that I can easily start to feed her stuff. She’s like her father, and if what I have heard about her father is true, she wants facts, and she’s going to want to see things with her own eyes. I can’t exactly bring a venin to her, but I can make sure that she finds enough other things to help her see the truth of it, and then we can make sure that she’s brought in with the biggest thing I have behind me.”
“Brennan,” Garrick said.
“It’s a crazy plan. You didn’t like the first years, even when you were a first year. How are you going to get anyone to believe that you have her best intentions at heart?”
“Well, I heard something the other day that made it interesting to me. Our dear rule follower pain in the ass Dain Aetos is friends with her.”
“How the hell did you figure that out?” Garrick asked.
“I heard General Sorrengail talking to her closest friend and Dain’s father. That Dain will protect her as well but the thing is that I think that Dain’s a little more than friends with her. I am not sure if they have ever had sex, but the way that I have heard Dain talk about someone who was at home and who was going to be waiting on him when he was able to send letters makes me think it’s her. Aetos and Sorrengail have worked together for years, and he’s her aide. As it stands, Violet’s never going to make it through the Gauntlet without doing something that’s probably never been done before, and while the Codex is light on what’s allowed and not allowed when it comes to that, there are certain things that one cannot do. She’s going to have to be creative to get up the last parts. Dain’s a rule follower who will see his father dead rather than break a rule, and I think it’ll help my cause if that happens sooner rather than later. Because I doubt that Violet’s going to be any different.”
Xaden let the two of them think about that. They both knew exactly what Aetos was like. There was going to be a lot of changing plans. Xaden had no clue what Violet was even like.
“So, are you going to seduce her?” Bohdi asked as he moved over to get some water from the pitcher on the far side of the room.
Xaden stocked the water all the time as there were chances that he didn’t trust what he was given in places. He knew that he was paranoid, but given who he was, he had to be.
“Not that way. I mean, she’s got to be starved for affection of some kind, right? Friends who like her for who she is. People who don’t see her mother, her sister, or her supposed dead brother. She’s coming in as a legacy that is found lacking, and we all know that. I’m going to spend a little time watching her with Major Gilstead. Make sure that she’s not some raging idiot who I can’t stand, and this ruins everything.”
“How are you even going to get her to trust you at all?”
“By revealing what her mother asked of me and making sure that she knows that while I don’t mind being seen as someone who is buttering up to General Sorrengail so as not to die, I will never lie to her about that part of things.”
“You are just going to tell her?”
“Something like that. I’ve not fully decided, but it’s the plan I’ve got right now. Everything is going to be around what Violet is like.”
“Violet, huh?”
“I can’t really think that I’m going to keep her strung along and side with me if I keep on calling her Sorrengail, can I?”
“Are you sure this is the best thing?”
“No, but at least with this, I can make sure I hurt General Sorrengail for what she did to us. To what she has given me.” Xaden rolled his shoulders. He hadn’t been able to feel the marks on him in a long time. He would never be able to hide the rebellion relic on his arm and up his neck, but one day, it would be known what it was. Why they all had it, even the one who had been unborn? Why Melgren couldn’t see them and why the Codex was added to.”
“The meeting that we have set in place…”
“I’ll debate whether to bring her or not. I’ll see how that goes. I can’t be too overt at the start, or she will run back to her mother and tell her. Or, at worst, tell Aetos, and he’ll do something about it. We are standing on a knife’s edge.”
Bodhi snorted. “We’ve been there for a long time. I just don’t want revenge to be the thing that gets us screwed over, but I trust you. We can work on revenge a little, and the look on General Sorrengail’s face when she’s faced with her daughter on the rebellion side of things will be great to see.”
Xaden agreed. He looked at Garrick, who nodded. The man was of fewer words than Xaden, which was normal. He would also think about it and hit Xaden with things when he least expected it, but it would help him in the long run. It’s how they worked, and it was going to work.
The taste of revenge would be sweet on his lips. He wanted to tear down everything Navarre stood for, and what better way to do it than the soldier on whom Navarre rested its laurels?
—
Xaden waited for Sgaeyl to land fully before he got off her. She took off immediately and headed back to the Vale to where she could be with Tairn. The bond between them would mean that Sgaeyl would need to see him a lot when Xaden left Basgiath and was assigned wherever he was on the war front in a year. It wasn’t going to be hard because Tairn would be able to go where he wanted. He answered only to Codagh as his den leader. There was no one else holding him there.
The mission had gone well to get the daggers where they needed to go and in the hands of those who could do something with them. Of course, Xaden was never going to get to sleep. He wrapped his shadows around him and made sure that he blended in with what was around him as much as possible, evading the mage lights that were scattered in the areas to make sure that there was some kind of light around.
He found himself in the areas of the college where people who worked there lived. Of course, there were more guards around, but Xaden found he was in the area where Violet was training. He slipped to the corner as he felt the arrival of someone. There was only determination in their intentions, but still, Xaden made sure that he blended in the corner shadows. It wouldn’t do for him to be found there at night out after curfew was engaged.
Xaden frowned when he saw it was Violet. She looked like she had been trying to sleep but was unable. The shadows under her eyes were visible even in the low light from the mage lights.
Violet looked determined, and Xaden wasn’t sure what he was going to see as she started to warm up. He could see the wraps under her clothes. There was something wrong with her, and he knew it but had no idea what it was. The research that he had done into General Sorrengail talked about her being sick when he was pregnant, but Xaden had no idea what could have happened to Violet.
“She’s stronger than she knows if this is what six months have given her. She’s got areas that are lacking, but it is a good idea to watch her. Maybe I could check it out so you are not tired of gearing up for Conscription Day. She needs sleep, but it’s best to do something instead of nothing when sleep doesn’t come, at least for humans.”
Xaden agreed with Sgaeyl but didn’t say anything; his attention was on Violet. There were hints of things that Xaden could make sure she was taught to get her better at fighting, but Major Gilstead seemed not to want to make sure that she fought the way she would be able to. Some people didn’t understand how to adapt fighting to fit other people. There was going to be a steep curve to what Violet was going to get to learn.
“You are looking forward to this as more than just screwing General Sorrengail over. You want to make sure that Violet lives, and you’ve never even met her.”
“Shut up,” Xaden said.
It was just a week from Conscription day, and Xaden still wasn’t sure that Violet would even cross the parapet. He would make sure he was where he could help her. Violet being dead wasn’t going to help him get what he wanted.
“I hope that her sister is going to do what she can to make sure that Violet lives as well. I cannot even fathom how Mira has to feel about this.” Sgaeyl almost sounded forlorn about that. Of course, it was rare for Sgaeyl to feel anything like it, but in the end, it was what it was.
Xaden was an only child, but he was close to Bodhi, and he figured that how he felt about him was how one felt about a sibling. It was easy to equate the two, and he knew what he would do to make sure that Bodhi lived. There was little that Xaden wouldn’t do. Mira had to be the same, given that Violet was the only surviving sibling that Mira thought she had.
There was a set of practice daggers, and the points were kept up to make sure that they did what they needed, but nicks and chips weren’t cared about. They were for learning, not killing.
And yet, Violet could get them where they needed to go in the wooden dummy she was using once she had warmed up and gone through some kind of movement practice.
“She’s good at that.” Xaden was glad there was something that was ranged fighting for her to know. She probably had to have a smaller bow to be able to shoot, and that meant that it wasn’t going to do as much but that. Her deadly precision with the daggers was something that Xaden could work from. It wouldn’t help with getting her over the parapet, but he wondered how Major Gilstead hadn’t worked on getting her balance good. A balance beam and good boots would have been needed.
More and more, Xaden was wondering if Lilith Sorrengail was setting her daughter up to be killed. There was so much going on that didn’t make sense except for that.
When Violet missed the first throw with the dagger, and it did not even nick the dummy, Violet seemed to sag, and she walked over to sit down and started to work on cooling down, it seemed.
There was nothing to do but leave, but Xaden found himself watching her anyway. She was kind of entrancing.
“It’s dangerous to get anything close to that involved.”
Sgaeyl was a good voice of reason, but Xaden knew that he needed to make sure that he would keep Violet on his side. He wasn’t above using how he looked to get her to him, but he wasn’t going to cross that line into something more without there being feelings involved.
“We are walking a tightrope, Xaden. We need to make sure that this doesn’t tip us over that edge into nothing.”
“I’m well aware.”
The knife’s edge was that the kids of the rebellion leader were on a tightrope, but the issue was that they had always been. They had always been where they were because there was no one to trust in this. He was alone in everything. It was the kind of thing that made it hard to know who to trust, and he hoped that Violet ended up being someone he could trust with this. Not just for her sake because he would kill her if needed but because having someone like her and her name in the rebellion would help in the long run.
It was going to be a balancing act, not unlike going across the parapet to make sure that he wasn’t lying to Violet about things. He would need to make sure that he was choosy in what he said and what didn’t. He would have to tell her that there were things he wouldn’t ever tell her and hope that she didn’t get pissed off about that.
“You could tell her that you are keeping secrets that are not yours to share and that she will just have to wait for those other people to tell her.”
“Always the voice of reason.” Xaden smiled before he moved to leave. He looked back at Violet one last time, wanting to see her to make sure she was safe before he left her there in a vulnerable position, but at the moment, no one was after her. There was no reason to even think about anything but walking away.
—
“Are you really still going to do this?” Bodhi asked as he stood outside of Xaden’s door. It was open as Xaden finished getting ready. They had all gotten in very late the night before because they had done a last run before they would be unable to for a short while.
“It’s the best way forward. We cannot keep this secret forever; having her on our side is the best. It’s not like I’m manipulating her that much, just not going out there and acting like I want to kill her like most people think I want to do. Even her mother is going to assume that it’s just me doing what she asked of me.”
Bodhi looked at Garrick, who just shrugged his shoulders. There was something else there.
“What?” Xaden asked. He didn’t shove a dagger into every single slot on his body that he could. He should, but he felt that maybe things would be better if he didn’t.
“I can’t even understand the basis of this beyond stealing General Sorrengail’s daughter from her and turning her traitor. We already have Brennan for that. It will hurt her more if he’s the one revealed to side with us.”
“Ah, you aren’t thinking long term.” Xaden shoved the last dagger where it belonged before looking at Bodhi.
“Having both Brennan and Violet means that Mira follows as well. Having all three of them on our side because Lilith Sorrengail made a deal to keep Violet alive after she herself shoved Violet in here. Well, that’s going to mean that we will have that upper hand.”
Xaden waved his hand at Garrick.
“You want all three of them.”
“I do. Because with them also comes others. Just from watching Violet as she trains, I can tell that she will pull people to her. I will have to see who that is and what happens with it, but that’s more for our cause.”
“There are times that I worry about that brain of yours,” Bodhi said, but he was smiling. It was kind of nice to see it. Things had been getting worse, and they all knew it.
Brennan didn’t think there was a lot of time left, but Xaden couldn’t see how to get the war to go again. Navarre would stick its head in the sand so long they would be out of food. There were trade agreements that, in the end, were going to end because the venin were on their way.
“Let’s go and see what the babies are like,” Garrick said.
Xaden followed them out into the area. He had to be on his best behavior, but thankfully, Sgaeyl would make up for that later. Being a wingleader was just another finger in the face of the people who thought that crossing the parapet was going to kill them or that their other classmates would kill them just for who they were. In the end, most of the kids here realized early on that the Marked Ones were going to be the best at a lot of things. Xaden only had to kill a single person for coming after him in a way that didn’t shame him. After that, no one really touched him at all. He was left to do what he wanted, and it made it easier to make sure that he was ready if it came again. The ones who joined last year were still floundering a little, and Xaden knew that, in the end, they would get less and less. There was already a change in the ones who came in. Less teaching in the way of fighting and other things.
“Less or more than last year?” Garrick asked when they stopped before looking down to the other side of things.
“Hmm, not sure, honestly. I am not going to put money on it,” Xaden said.
Garrick knocked his shoulder into Xaden’s and then waved at where the carts were getting into position to start to carry the bodies out after they fell down. “Think we will have a person falling off the turret and killing someone again?”
“That was something, wasn’t it? I’ve never understood a lot of this. It does take a lot to fly a dragon, but a lot of these things would be better if it weren’t so…I can’t help but think that everything to do with all of the training for the four quadrants is something that is being used to keep the population down and make sure that no one questions anything. We know that the fliers are not taught like this. They are at war as well. It’s like everything just kept becoming worse and worse here, but I can’t see a different way going forward unless everyone in the higher-ups is killed off.”
Garrick turned to lean on the wall and looked at Xaden from the side. “It’s what it’s going to take, and I think that’s also what your father wanted, more than just revealing the venin to the people.”
“There was more that I know he didn’t share with me, and I think that there are other small pockets of people who are working against the King and his people who maintain the lies. I can’t even think beyond that and what it might mean. I just have to go forward with what I know.”
“I think this is a great plan. You are using the truth to turn Violet against her mother, and many might think that it’s wrong, but we know what sometimes has to be done in war.”
“And this is war, no matter what the sheep of this country know. We cannot just allow anything to happen that would hurt that. It’s shitty that we have to be the ones to do it, but in the end, they killed off the ones who were better suited because they are afraid of their empire coming tumbling down and having to deal with the fallout.”
Garrick nodded. They were always in agreement on that. There was nothing to do but get ready to watch a bunch of kids kill themselves today and then make it like they were brave for making it across the parapet. Worse things were coming at them, and while Xaden understood keeping parts of it hidden, he didn’t think that all of it should be as it was. There was too much needless death when those bodies could be used to fight, but this was how it had been. He still had no idea what kind of government would replace it. It was the biggest stumbling block that his father had as well. Going as they could was the only way to do it. They were working with what helped the most people.
They just had to survive what was coming, and then maybe they could work on a better world.
Chapter Three
Conscription Day was always a feeling that Xaden liked. He would probably have to deal with that one day, but this was the last one. Last year, he had made sure that he had kept his shields up and made sure that no one was able to get through them. The biggest thing that Xaden would need to do this year was to make sure that he didn’t do something that would get him in trouble with Violet or anyone else. This was the point where it was make or break.
“You are nervous.”
“All of my plans bank on this, Sgaeyl. I need to make sure to do this right. I don’t have an issue with her, and she’s correct. Killing her would do nothing. Killing Mira would be the one that would hurt her, but in all honesty, making sure that she knows that Brennan is alive and with me, well, that’s going to hurt the worst. I have no fight with Violet. She’s a means to an end that I need to make sure stays with me.”
There was a pulse of emotion down the bond, and Xaden knew that Sgaeyl didn’t fully believe him, and Xaden wasn’t sure why he didn’t believe himself either. The whole thing was balanced on this moment that was coming up.
Xaden knew Violet on sight, but he made sure he was where he could talk to her before going across. He liked being here to see the mettle of the people who were getting ready to go across. It would also give him access to Violet before she got into Dain’s hands. He still hadn’t decided what he was going to do with that. Her going to Dain meant Second Wing and Xaden would have issues getting the access he wanted to her. Moving Dain and his whole squad to Fourth Wing would mean he would have to deal with Dain whispering in Violet’s ear.
“What are you going to tell her to make her trust you?”
Xaden pushed away Sgaeyl, and she just snorted at him. He could see the look that had to be on her face. There were a lot of things that Xaden could tell her, but the biggest was being honest about why he was doing this. Her mother wanted someone to help protect her, and it didn’t seem that she thought that Dain was enough. It was simple and honest.
“Who thinks that a girl that small would be a good rider? Why hasn’t her parents or anyone else stopped her?”
Xaden stepped up to where the guy from Second Wing was standing at the edge of the turret and looking down. Xaden knew Violet on sight, but at least now he had an idea of what Mira looked like. He could see little bits of Brennan in both of them, at least what he could see of Mira from the distance. There was nothing to say as he took her in. It looked like someone had talked sense into Violet as the backpack she was wearing didn’t look to be too full of things. Her boots looked like they might not kill her, and her outfit wouldn’t help take her off the parapet.
He saw the glint of daggers already strapped to her body. At least Mira knew enough to make sure she was able to defend herself on the parapet.
Parapet was one of those things that showed someone’s character. Xaden hated the people who went across, killing as they went. Those were the ones that became dangerous to others most of the time. It was too early for any kind of killing like that. Fast didn’t mean better. Sometimes, it was slow and steady that won the race.
Pushing away, Xaden went back to what he was supposed to be doing. There would come a time for him to make sure that he saw Violet before she went across.
When Violet came out of the turret, she was talking with another candidate, and it looked like they were on their way to becoming good friends. It would be good for Violet to have someone beyond the people that Xaden would move around her. The guy behind her had all kinds of bad attitudes. Xaden didn’t like him off the bat.
“With this storm going on, it would be easy to kill him.”
Xaden loved how bloodthirsty Sgaeyl was. He knew the storm wasn’t going to let up, and it was another thing in the line of things that made Xaden think that Lilith Sorregengail wanted to kill her own daughter. He would make sure she lived through this part and that Violet knew that it was him. She would have chances to kill her own enemies later, but it would be a good pull to him.
Stepping up to her, Xaden grinned at Violet and looked at the girl in front of her.
“Make it across, and I’ll make sure that you get into my wing,” Xaden said.
Violet looked at him with more than a little shock on her face.
“Why?” Violet asked.
Xaden just gave her a smile before he looked at the line for going across the parapet. “Let’s just say I have my reasons.”
“Ugh, you need the hot guy to make sure you get into a wing that won’t kill you as soon as they can.”
Xaden looked at the boy who said it, and the ill feelings from him were still there. He didn’t back down when Xaden turned to the side to leave. His marks were on full display then, and he felt the change in feelings from Violet as she realized exactly who he was, maybe not that he was Xaden Riorson but that he was a child of the rebellion.
Trying not to make it look like he was watching her, he saw Violet swap a boot with the girl in front of her. Xaden wasn’t sure it was a good idea, but he also knew that he had no say in this. The girl’s foot was at least a size bigger than Violet’s, but that kind of discomfort wouldn’t stop her from crossing. Seeing the bottom of the boot when Violet put it on, he saw why Violet did it. He figured that he was going to have to deal with her taking in strays. Whatever squad she was put in would all be her people, or at least most of them.
The plan hadn’t survived much at all of what they wanted. Violet wasn’t going to be isolated, so he needed to make sure that the people she wanted in there were there.
“As it is with someone who is mostly isolated. You cannot think Lilith Sorrengail would allow her around anywhere. She has been in the Archives for five years and probably isolated to just her siblings and Dain Aetos before that.”
“Always the wise one.” Xaden smiled as the girl with Violet stepped up to give her name. Rhiannon Mathias. A name he would need to remember.
Then, it was Violet’s turn.
“Violet Sorrengail,” Violet said.
The lightning crack made a few candidates jump a little, but Violet didn’t react at all. Given her mother’s signet, storms had to be comforting in some way. The rain was coming down harder, but Violet was steady as she got ready.
Xaden jerked his head toward her, but he smiled when she looked at him with a little bit of fear but a lot of bluster in her expression. Xaden just smiled at her. The one he knew made people melt a little. He knew what he looked like and how to use it for what he wanted, even if he didn’t do it often.
“Don’t worry; my quarrel is not with you but with your mother,” Xaden said.
Violet started across, and Xaden turned his gaze to the boy behind her.
“Why would you even offer that?”
“Because there are things that matter more than having the strongest wing. Strong fighters are needed, but there are a lot of things about war that you don’t even understand in your quest to become the fastest, fittest, and strongest in your eyes.’
“Dragons don’t like weak people.”
“No, they don’t, but you see someone who is weak; I see someone who is strong because she’s still fighting for her life when most would have given up. You don’t see the world in the way that it is.”
“I’m going to kill her.”
Xaden shrugged.
“Jack Barlowe,” the boy said when he stepped up and grabbed the edge to boost himself onto it. He walked out a little way and then turned around.
Xaden looked at the boy who was following Jack and felt what the boy was feeling, his intentions. There was too much going on there. Still, there was a choice there.
“Saving the boy would do nothing.”
“I’m coming for you next, Sorrengail!” Jack yelled.
Violet turned around on the parapet, and she looked in horror as Jack tossed the kid after him off the stone. Then Jack turned and headed for Violet.
The wind picked up, and Violet turned around to face Jack when she got near the other edge. She was playing it smart, waiting for her to be safe. If Jack threw her off, the rider on the other side would be well within his rights to throw him off as well, given that she was safe now.
Xaden reached out, his shadows thinning out as they ran under the parapet. It would be simple since Jack wasn’t paying attention to his feet, but Violet was. Xaden reacted when Jack hit an area that was already cracked. He made a loop of shadow up and then used it to trip Jack.
For a second, it looked like Violet would reach out and try to save him, but then, in the end, she didn’t. Trying that would have taken them both over it.
Violet stepped fully away, and now she wasn’t an issue anymore. Xaden needed to focus on who else was there.
—
Xaden wasn’t shocked to find Violet and Rhiannon in the Second Wing. That was where Dain was the squad leader, but Xaden had a few favors that were owed to him. He could get the whole squad moved over and then work on Violet right under Dain’s nose.
Dain’s emotions were all over him as Xaden looked at them as they made their way back to the formation. Violet looked like she finally had the wraps around her legs. That was one of the first things that he was going to figure out about her. Reading intentions wasn’t enough to know why she had to do it.
The meeting, once Xaden made it across, was short and sweet. He would let them all think that Xaden wanted to kill Violet himself, and it was why he wanted her whole squad moved over. It would have been easier just to move Violet and Rhiannon since Dain had already made them part of his unit as a pair.
Dain’s fear as they moved was enough to make Xaden feel powerful. He wasn’t sure if this would last long, as he planned on making sure that Violet was away from him as quickly as possible. Dain would never support anything that Xaden was planning on doing. Dain would make sure that it was all exposed, so Xade needed her away from him as fast as possible.
There were parts of this that were never told to anyone, from the torture that riders endured the next year to the first formation and the arrival of the wingleader’s dragons.
Xaden stayed back, listening to Dain’s plea again to get Violet out of there. Dain was going to make it easier to ensure that Violet pulled away from him.
The love that radiated from Dain toward Violet was interesting, along with the feeling from Violet that felt like it might be love, but it was weak. Dain hadn’t fed it in a while. It wasn’t just the fact that Dain hadn’t been around her in a while; it was that it was weak to start with. Violet had a crush, and she thought it was love.
When Sgaeyl landed, Violet looked at her with wide eyes and a curiosity that spoke of her time learning to be a scribe. There was a lot that they would be able to talk about.
“I’m not a show horse,” Sgaeyl said.
“No, but we need to know what we need to do when she bonds with a dragon. She needs help learning how to fly, and the dragon who bonds her will need to make concessions to help her fly.”
“I never thought about that,” Sgaeyl said.
The cadets who ran weren’t going to live, and they were going to die by dragon fire, which was the method of death that many thought was the biggest death reason. None of them were recorded on what exactly was the method of death for cadets, even later on riders. It was just the day they died. This was the reason that Xaden had been able to take out a few of the people he had on Threshing day in his first year. He had killed more than his fair share of people who were not conducive to a squad that didn’t try and kill each other. He would never feel bad about it.
When it was all said and done and Violet was following Dain out of there, Violet looked back at Xaden a few times.
—
“What game are you playing?” Dain demanded as he stepped in front of Xaden.
“Is that how to speak to your wingleader?” Garrick asked. He stayed behind Xaden, letting Xaden hand the physical part of it.
“What kind of game do you think I’m playing, Aetos?”
“When he’s fucking around with my oldest friend, yes.”
“Who says I’m fucking around with her?”
“Everyone knows how much you hate her.”
“I don’t hate innocents. Lilith Sorrengail made her choices, but I’m not going to get my revenge on anyone but her for what she did.”
“So that’s your game. You are going to turn Violet against her mother.”
“I don’t think I have to do much, even if that’s my plan.” Xaden stepped into Aetos’ personal space and used the shadows around them to make sure the man couldn’t step back away from him. “I think that Sorrengail made her feelings for Violet very well known the moment she forced her daughter across the parapet. I heard from someone who overheard you two that she told Violet that if she didn’t go up, she would drag her up and throw her onto the parapet.”
Dain stepped back right into Xaden’s shadows, which were like a wall behind him. He snarled at Xaden.
“She will see through you.”
“Or will she cling to someone willing to ensure she survives this and is allowed what she wants? You want to shove her out of here.”
“Her mother is the only reason she wants to be a rider. It’s not the Violet I know! She doesn’t belong here,” Dain yelled.
The gasp was music to Xaden’s ears. He didn’t even have to look around Dain to see where Violet was with Rhiannon. There was a small group with her as well. Xaden was good at egging people on. It was something his father had taught him how to do a long time ago. That it worked on Dain was like child’s play. Xaden wondered if Dain ever tried to control himself at all unless it came to breaking a rule.
“Vi,” Dain said as he turned to face her, but Violet had a look on her face of pure anger, and it was glorious to see. If there wasn’t the whole he was her superior, Xaden might be tempted by something with her, the fact she was a first-year be damned. It was nice to see the others with Violet working on getting her out of there. She walked past Dain without a second look at him.
“It’s nice to know how you really feel,” Xaden said.
“I didn’t mean…she’s…” Dain looked like he was lost.
“You want to protect her. I get that, but in the end, protecting her means that she’s stuck here. She crossed, and there is no way out but a dead body or an injury that isn’t mended.”
“You are ruthless, but what makes you think he’s going to latch onto that?” Sgaeyl’s voice was calm but deadly.
“Because he’s so focused on saving her that he doesn’t see something wrong with it. He will push her away all on his own, and I won’t have to lift a finger.”
Xaden waited for Dain to leave before he went about his part of the morning. Battle Brief was interesting, with Violet being even smarter than Xadcen would have thought. She had good ideas, even if she was trying to make it like she didn’t.
Challenges would be Violet’s weak point, and Xaden wasn’t sure how to get inside her circle to help her with them. He might have to end up sticking Liam in there to get someone in there who knew how to fight. He needed to see Violet’s circle of friends to know if Liam was needed.
—
Assessment Day was one of the days that Xaden looked forward to when he was in his first year. He wanted to show what he was made of, and he wanted to make sure that no one came after him.
On the other hand, Violet wasn’t going to fare well, and it would mean that things would turn for the better or the worse when it came to that.
Deaths were rare since it wasn’t supposed to happen at all, but there were those cadets who thought that they were on the other side of it, and they were allowed. The thing was that those who flocked to the ones who killed like that were never good people.
Xaden could have seen Jack Barlowe on the floor, killing someone. He was a good threat to have gone. Two others seemed to be taking a run at being bullies.
“I hate bullies. I want to eat them, even if they taste like shit.”
Xaden smiled as Sgaeyl hated bullies, but she hated the taste of humans even more.
Violet was paired with a guy whom Xaden hadn’t gotten to get the measure of yet. He had hoped that she would be paired with someone whom Xaden could control, as that meant no serious injury. Many were targeting Violet for her mother’s name and the fact that they assumed her weakness.
Xaden had figured out a little more about what was wrong with her just from being around in a few places where he could hear discussions outside of watching Gilstead training her. She was in pain nearly all of the time.
Imogen was beside Xaden as she groaned when the fight started to go wrong.
“She needs a lot of help on that front.”
“I’m well aware, but I can’t just insert myself in there. I offered help, and she’s not taken me up on it yet. I need her to want it. I can’t force it.”
“I know. I…I am not sure of your plan, and I would rather kill her, but I like it. It hurts worse, doesn’t it? Knowing that the kid is alive but on the other side, and will have to be killed like all traitors before. Killing her own child does make it more poetic.”
They were surrounded by allies in this, even if they were not Marked Ones. There were times when it was impossible to abide by no more than three when it was the whole wing being assembled, especially as more and more of them made it into the college.
The crack was sickening, but the worst of it was the fact that Violet didn’t even cry out in pain. No, that came from Dain.
“He really has no want to hide where his affections lie, does he?” Liam asked.
“No, he really doesn’t. It’s honestly kind of pitiful. I think that she’ll be in our clutches soon.”
“Why do you think that?”
“Because I’m pretty sure he’s going to ask whatever healer there is to heal her that way and not have Nolon mend her. Nolon has mended her for years. It’s not hard to find that kind of information if you know where to look for it. If she can’t use her arm, she can’t be here and would be allowed to go to the scribes, usually, but I have a feeling that her mother would keep her where she is as a point of pride.”
“Have you figured out why General Sorrengail even cares about her being in the riders?” Imogen asked.
“No idea. I’m not sure it’s rooted in anything but pride. Her genes will out over her husbands.”
“Her dead husband,” Liam said. He snorted when the assessments started up again, and the guy who had broken Violet’s arm seemed freaked out. “it’s like she has no care to honor him in their children. Like they are only hers.”
“I’m not sure I understand the dynamic there, but I’ll figure it out.” Xaden nodded at the others, and he slipped away. The rest of the wing would have to deal with just Garrick watching. He could assess what was needed just as easily as he could. Xaden had places to be.
Going all the way to the healers wasn’t the way to go, but he could head back to Violet’s barracks and make sure that she was settled in for the rest of the day after being healed. It was a way to show that, as a wingleader, he cared about her. It might also just get him a few points for her believing that he wasn’t just wanting to kill her like everyone was telling her.
—
The knock on his door just before curfew was a shock. He lowered his shields a little, and Xaden was shocked when it was Violet out there. He got up and walked over to open his door. He leaned in the doorway and looked at her.
“Can I help you, Cadet Sorrengail?”
“I need…Rhi’s a good fighter, but I think that I need more than she can even give me. I still want to train with her, and I…” Violet swallowed, looking worried about something. “I will not die here, and Dain wants to keep me exactly as he wants me.”
“Liam’s a wonderful fighter. I could maybe facilitate a transfer to make sure that he’s in your squad so that you can have a good fighter who will help you. How do you feel about that?”
“Not you?”
“I would be willing when I have time in there as well, but Liam is the best person for you to start out with. Imogen would be willing to help you build muscle.”
“Why?”
“Because what better way to prove I’m loyal to Navarre and her intestines than to make sure the daughter of the woman who caught my father and for all intents and purposes put him to death lives? I also think that we have gone too far into the idea that strength is needed over anything else when it comes to this. Dragons are smart and use what they are given, but there is a reason they are fewer and fewer willing to bond every year.”
Violet nodded, and she turned away from him, heading back to where she was supposed to be until the time when she bonded with a dragon.
“I want to know what Dain said to her that caused this.”
Xaden agreed with Sgaeyl’s words, but he figured he could be pressed to come up with an answer.
“I’m sure that he said exactly what I thought he would about it. He’s not the smartest person in the world when it comes to emotions. He wanted her in the scribes where she would stay and be the person he remembered. The Riders Quadrant exposes who someone is, and I think that Violet’s going to find Dain lacking, and I didn’t even have to do a damned thing about that.”
Xaden didn’t go back into his room until he was sure she was in her barrack. He smiled to himself as he thought about what he would be doing from here out to make sure that Dain stayed off balance. It wouldn’t do for him to get a clue.
“We just have to get her to Threshing and then from there make sure that she doesn’t get killed by an unbonded.”
Xaden snorted at that. Just because she bonded with a dragon didn’t make her safe, and they both knew that.
“I’ll talk to Liam in the morning to make sure that he’s still okay with moving into the squad. The earlier, the better. Hopefully, a few deaths will make it necessary to move a few people around to make squads balanced.”
Xaden picked up the dagger he was looking at. It was ridiculous to have them ready for her when it was time to pull her in a little more, but in the end, he needed her to think he was doing all this for her.
He had been working on a small collection for a while, and he would make sure that, at some, made it into her group as time went on. Even if it was someone taking one from him and then her taking it from them.
Everything was still a delicate balance that he needed to figure out and keep a check on.
“Sleep because you need to make sure that you don’t mess up tomorrow.”
—
Dain was waiting for Xaden when he made it out of his room, and for a split second, Xaden wondered if Dain was going to break one of his precious rules.
“You are going to get her killed,” Dain said.
“No, you are going to do that by coddling her. The difference between you and me, Aetos, is that when it comes down to it, I’m going to do what I can to make sure the people I care for get out of here alive. I’m going to lose some, but that’s just the cards we were dealt when our parents rebelled. You are trying to make sure that she’s safe and out of here, but you are making those choices for her.” Xaden didn’t let the little bit of guilt wrack him because he was doing the same. He was making choices for her, but he was working with what he had. He had been given an order when it came to her, and he was going to make sure that it was held.
“She doesn’t belong here. She belongs with the scribes. She belongs in class with Jesinia, doing what she thought she would do her entire life. Not this. Never this.”
“And yet, here she is through no choice of her own, but now she wants it. You can’t even understand that she wants this, can you? She wants this, and you can’t stop her without making a decision for her, which is what her mother did. She forced her in here, Dain, and now you are saying that she can’t stay.”
Xaden knew that whatever he said wasn’t going to stick with Dain. He would keep doing what he was doing, but at least Xaden could say he tried. It was simple to move people around, and there was a lot he hadn’t done that he wanted to do, just to make sure he didn’t tip his hand.
“You don’t understand her. This isn’t her.”
“Or this is her, but no one allowed her ever to be herself.” Xaden wasn’t going to stick around and allow Dain to piss him off even more. He shut his door and walked past him.
“I’m not done!” Dain yelled down the hall.
Xaden waved his hand dismissively. Garrick stood at his door, looking like he had enjoyed the show.
“You know, there are some of the first years who have started to place bets on whether you two are fighting over Violet or if there is some kind of unresolved sexual tension there, and Violet’s just the cover for it.”
Xaden snorted.
“So, your plans are going well.”
“Aetos is making it easy on me. I don’t have to do much to get him riled up enough to where he just freaks out. Violet’s getting herself into enough trouble.”
“Tynan and Oren are going to be issues. They seem to have joined forces and are bullying a lot of people, but they have issues with anyone seen as weak. We will need to watch them to make sure they aren’t going to make a move on anything.”
“They are cowards, so they won’t do something like Jack Barlowe would have.”
“Who is that?”
“The boy I killed on the parapet.”
“Ah, the one who was going to gun for Violet and mess up your plans.”
Xaden glared at Garrick, but he let Garrick lead them where they needed to go. There was too much going on, and things were not going to go well at all. The year had barely started, and already, he was feeling like he needed a vacation. A few things were going on that were outside of his control, but the rest was.
“Tonight, you and I are flying, and you are going to enjoy it.”
“What’s that look?” Garrick asked.
“Sgaeyl told me that we are going to go flying, and I’m going to enjoy it. I think it was a threat, not a promise.”
Garrick laughed, and for a few seconds, Xaden could believe that he didn’t have the weight of the world on his shoulders, which was something that Xaden hadn’t felt for more than a few moments. His head had been there since his father had left to start the rebellion. It was also the last time he had slept well. There were a few seconds of time where Xaden thought about the world where maybe it hadn’t happened, where the rebellion had not died in the methods it had, and things had changed. Where Navarre had been the one to bow down and admit what it had lied to its people about for six hundred years, that world was gone, and with it, any chance of Xaden ever being happy again.
Chapter Four
Despite it being a law not to meet up like they were, Xaden had never found that anyone really cared. Security never checked in the areas where it was possible to meet up like that. It had never been hard to meet up, and this was so different. The only difference was Violet in the tree. He debated for a few seconds about whether he wanted to have her know that he knew she was there, but he left it. Let her see what they were doing and allow it to make her more inclined to trust him.
“And Sorrengail?” one of the new first-years asked.
“She’s not her mother, and you will not get revenge. We’ve already got too much blood. My father killed her brother; her mother made it possible for my father to die. We cannot have stupid revenge stopping us from defending Navarre in the best way possible.”
“And you think that she’ll be a good rider?”
“She already deals with more than you ever have, and you will have to teach her to figure it all out.”
Violet was good at staying silent, and she was limber enough to be able to get up the tree and hold herself up there without making noise.
“She’s becoming more and more intriguing to me,” Sgaeyl said.
“Agreed.”
“And training her? Is that wise?”
“You never know when someone small is going to be needed to save your life,” Garrick said.
Xaden sent them all on their way in small groups, and he stayed behind, signaling to Garrick for him to leave. Once he was alone with Violet, he walked over to the tree she was sitting in to see what she would do. He pulled out a dagger and started to flip it around in the air before catching it.
Ten minutes later, Violet still hadn’t moved at all, so Xaden looked up, using his shadows to part the branches to get a look at her face. “You gonna stay up there forever.”
“You…knew I was here?”
“My shadows know all, Violet. You should remember that. I know you aren’t going to do anything about what you just heard.”
“Why?”
“Because as much as you are a rule follower, we did nothing wrong that if this was a group of kids from any other place would get in trouble for.” Xaden stepped back to allow Violet to get down from where she was without having to move to another section of the tree. Violet looked at him, and she didn’t take her eyes off him as she made her way down the tree.
“You are just trying to help kids who are going to be gunned for. I’ve heard things from others who want to make sure that you and your others don’t make it through. I never understood it. Why didn’t you tell them I was here?”
“They don’t need to know.” Xaden looked at Violet’s side and saw what she was going after.
Poisons. It was a good way to make sure that she survived challenges, but it would make her weak if she didn’t get other training in as well. At least, it would help in the meantime. Xaden wanted to see what was going to happen from that.
“You might want to get back to your room before your wingleader figures out you are out,” Xaden said as a parting shot as he walked away.
He laughed when Violet yelled back at him. He found her spirit something that attracted him to her. The attraction was dangerous, but it wasn’t like she would do anything about it. She wanted Aetos, or at least thought that she did.
—
Oren Siefert went down with little issue, and Violet came out on top. She had fought some, but in the end, the poisons had done what they were supposed to, which meant that outside of what she did with Rhiannon, Violet got little actual training against someone who didn’t worry about her.
“Liam,” Xaden said as he dropped down to sit with him at lunch. Liam looked afraid, but he didn’t react more than that.
“I’m moving, aren’t I?”
“I’m going to figure out how to get you into her squad because she needs someone who isn’t afraid of hurting her if need be to make sure that she can fight. Imogen’s going to watch over you all when you are training, and then you can watch when she’s training her. I don’t want her alone. There are too many here who aren’t afraid enough of me yet.”
Liam nodded and looked over at Violet, who was sitting with Sawyer, Ridoc, and Rhi. That trio would be hard to break into, and Xaden knew it, but he knew that Liam could do it.
“Rhiannon’s a good fighter, but she’s too afraid of hurting her; we need to make sure that she can actually fight if her poisons don’t work.”
“Figured that out, did you?” Xaden asked.
“Well, it doesn’t help that a stupid first year student from First Wing ate a berry and reacted like Oren did. Who taught her that?”
“I’m not sure. I haven’t gotten that close to her yet. I want to be closer, but she is still between Aetos and me on things.”
“Things between them are getting worse and worse. I heard another fight between them the other day. It seems like she doesn’t like him smothering her and how he’s reacting to you helping her, but I also think that he’s jealous.”
“He thinks he’s in love with her. I think. The only thing that makes sense is that I honestly don’t think he’s in love with her like that. He wants her controlled and where he can keep her safe, which he does in horrible ways. If there was a single thing that would get her kicked out and not killed, I think he would do it. He would ruin her to keep her, and that’s not love.”
Liam sighed and dug into his food as he looked around the room. They were the only ones at the table, which was rare, but Xaden figured it had more to do with Xaden sitting there than Liam.
“So Sawyer and Ridoc?”
“Teach them as well. Rhiannon, as well. All of them and anyone else she takes in. Dain is trying to force her hands on things, and this is something that I cannot think would be horrible to have: more people loyal to us.”
“Agreed. What do you think of Oren and Tynan?”
“Cowards is a good term for them. They try to hide behind the ethos that only the strongest survive but forget there are a few different kinds of strength. I wouldn’t be shocked if a dragon burned one of them on Presentation Day. In fact, I look forward to seeing who makes it out of there and who doesn’t. Just have to make it through Gauntlet, and then we can make more plans on what we need to do.”
—
Xaden looked at Liam, and he nodded. Liam had been doing well at making sure that Violet survived, but she was still too unwilling to really listen. She was stronger, but she wasn’t trying.
He dropped his daggers off with Imogen at the edge of the mat and looked at Violet. She looked scared. A glance at Aetos showed that he was pissed off.
When it was all said and done, Xaden cursed himself and didn’t like it. He didn’t like the way she acted on the mat with her. She hadn’t won, but he felt like she had. There was something else between them, and he needed to stop it. There was nothing good that would come of that. He wouldn’t use someone like that.
Violet was the centerpiece of his plans at the moment, and one false step would cause too many issues.
“You chose this path, and you need to stay the course. Make sure that you don’t do anything stupid, and things will be fine. Once we have her in our grasp, things will be easier as she will trust others more than you. Or at least equally and not search you out.”
Xaden knew that Sgaeyl’s words were honest, but there was a small part of him that didn’t want to give her up, but that would mean being honest with her about everything. Maybe it would be best to get that all off his chest. It would turn her against him but probably not send her back into Aetos’s arms. Yet, he was unwilling.
“Trust is the first thing that is needed, and she’s not there yet. Give yourself time.”
“There is not much I can do until I know that Violet won’t let Aetos touch her. So far, there is nothing that would really get us in trouble. The meeting is one thing, but in the end, even Aetos wouldn’t do that to her at the moment. Once he’s learned that he’s lost her, there will be things that happen, but there will be nothing there for him to take. She’ll be shielded from him.”
Xaden had to make sure that Aetos was under control until the point where it didn’t need to be worried about. There was too much at stake. Even that night when Violet had seen him with the others, she would be out of her head by the time Dain touched her again.
The issue was that Violet was still clinging to him in times of distress, but that was slowly changing. All was fair in war, which was the thing that his father had taught him. Yet, he was finding that there were some things he had to do that were not sitting well with him. But when compared to what Navaarre did to those who knew the truth and didn’t fall in line, it was nothing. He didn’t want to become them, but when it was a fight to live, there were few lines that he couldn’t cross.
Sgaeyl started to fade from his mind, and Xaden knew that he would have a rough night if the feelings he was getting were close to what was going down in the bond to Violet. Sgaeyl wasn’t always the best at blocking him out when it came to having time with Tairn.
Xaden didn’t even head to his room after his last class of the day. He went up to where he could be alone with a little bit of work. He found the spot he liked the most, which overlooked the area of the college that was just for the riders—the place where he was supposed to feel at home, but he didn’t.
He missed Aretia. he missed going there when he could, and that would hopefully be soon that he could get there to visit. Every single day, he missed his father. He hadn’t really missed his mother in a long time. She had left him behind without a thought since the contract only stated that he was to live to ten before she could fuck off to wherever she wanted. He knew from a young age that his parents didn’t love each other, but he had at least thought she would stick around for him. In the end, whatever love Xaden had for her had slowly slipped away as the years stacked up without him hearing from her.
Throwing up his shields even higher, Xaden tried to block out everything that wasn’t the setting sun. He wanted to have a little solace from the world since he didn’t have to worry about having to entertain Sgaeyl if she was bored. He didn’t want to have to go for the churam, but he would. He needed to make sure that he wasn’t going to bleed all over anyone, and his secondary signet was still as much of an unknown as it could be. It wasn’t like there was anything that survived about it beyond the people who were killed who became one.
Control was the biggest thing that Navarre had going for it. The country would go down in a wall of fire, and Xaden knew it. He needed to make sure that he and his survived it, but it was all he cared about. Violet was a means to an end he was getting too attached to. In the end, he needed to have something going for him, but Violet would run from him after everything with Violet and her mother, and Xaden came out. He needed to make sure that he wasn’t caught in the crossfire of it, but in the end, as long as his people lived, he didn’t care about dying himself. He would be more than happy to make sure that everyone else lived.
“Your brooding is a mood killer, Xaden.”
Xaden laughed. He leaned into the wall on the side of where he was and looked up into the sky. The whole thing was beautiful, and it was the kind of thing that made him miss Aretia even more.
“No one would fault you for missing the home you grew up in and how things were when life was simple.”
“I know. Life was simple but not in the way that most think it was. My father never lied to me. He never thought much beyond saving people. The lies that he was fed over the years were enough to make him jaded. The whole rebellion was in place to make sure that things were not able to go back, but in the end, things were back to where they were.”
“Until the timebomb that you are the other Marked Ones are. I support you, and you know this. The dragons might be split, but I will never allow this to go back to the way it was with no movement forward.”
“What does Tairn think about a lot of this?”
“My mate is my mate, and he’s still grieving Naolin. His bond to him was too strong, but it is who he is. Do not mistake that for weakness.”
“I never would. It’s enough that I think it’s a good thing. Too many dragons bond too weakly, and I think it’s part of why there are many humans lost. Even we don’t even care about saving our kind. We are just fodder to keep Naravvarians stupid about what is actually out there.”
Sgaeyl said nothing else, and the path between them was back to normal. Whatever was going on with Tairn and Sgaeyl was enough that Xaden knew he needed to keep his nose out of it. He wasn’t sure what was going to happen in the future.
“There is a hatchling that Tairn and I have adopted. Her parents died before she hatched. Tairn is busy with her.”
“You’ve got a kid, and you bonded with me?”
“Both happened around the same time. It’s nothing that you have to worry about. She’s two and fast, trying to think she’s bigger than she is. She’s been moody lately, and we think that she’s going to be jumping into what would be teenage years if she were human soon. I am leaving Tairn to deal with her and spending as much time with you as possible.”
Xaden made his way back to his rooms as he listened to Sgaeyl talk about the hatchling a little bit. It was interesting. He had wondered about them and their eggs and when they would make babies, but he hadn’t thought that part of it was that they already had one they were working on, even if she wasn’t theirs.
It made him think of his own mother again.
“Do not give her more thought than passing when you thank her for your birth on your birthday.”
“I try not to, but I think everything with Violet and her mother has brought it to the forefront more than normal.”
“People say that dragons don’t love their children, but in the end, that’s just projection because we care for our children as much as possible. You are the ones that throw children to the wolves when it comes to a war that is going on that has been lied about for four hundred years.”
Xaden didn’t disagree with her.
—
The Gauntlet was the biggest challenge of the year; it was the make-or-break moment. Death or dragons, even if they made it to the dragons, there was no promise that they would live through it. Xaden knew that Violet had her issues with the Gauntlet. The thing was that he knew that making sure she made it to the top was needed, but she needed to get up there herself.
Aetos wasn’t a help as he kept on teasing her to get her out of there and into the scribes. Violet might have the mind of a scribe, but she had the heart of a rider, and Xaden knew it. He also knew that the riders needed new people there. The smartest were always going to the scribes, and that meant that the riders stagnated. The smartest of the bunch were not going forward. The steps were needed to make sure that the riders who did make it were worthy of the dragons, but as proven by how many were killed by dragons on Presentation and Threshing Days, it wasn’t like it was the pinnacle of what was needed.
And yes, Violet made it up with a subtle push that the right way, the way it had been done by all cadets before her, wasn’t the only way. There was little time to think about much other than she had made it, and that meant that she was going to be moving on to the next part.
“I’ll be close,” Sgaeyl said when it was close to time for the cadets to start their trek through.
Xaden had his job and knew what he needed to do. It was hard to think that this was the one part he could do nothing with. She had to make it on her own, and that was it. There was little to do or think about beyond that.
When Violet’s group came out of the meadow, Xaden breathed a sigh of relief. There were a few less of them, and he was, for one, happy to see Luca gone, even if it was a shock. Pryor was not a shock. He would have driven a dragon mad in seconds after bonding. Sgaeyl had offered to take care of him several times already, and there were other dragons who had to agree. The boy hadn’t ever made a decision in his life that he didn’t waffle on and then regret the moment he chose the other thing.
Luca had been a staunch supporter of getting rid of Violet but had never gotten the guts to do anything about it.
“So, who likes our girl?”
“I’m not telling you anything, and you know it. Not all dragons will be bonding. Between who might die before getting to them and then not finding a human they like in the bunch, there are not a lot of good choices this year for all of them.”
Xaden smiled from where he was and watched as the last group went into the meadow. It was just two days until Threshing. There was a lot that he needed to do. There were going to be many who tried to gun for Violet, and even if Xaden couldn’t actually do anything per the rules, there was no way he was going to let someone kill her in there. If it was a dragon, it was a dragon.
“I already have our plans set out to do on Threshing Day beyond what you have to do, Xaden Riorson, and that means you are mine.”
Xaden nodded; even if Sgaeyl couldn’t see him, she understood the intent of it. He had wanted to make sure that Violet wasn’t killed, but he figured that Sgaeyl had the same thoughts. He would let her figure out what they were doing.
“What is up with the feathertail?”
Sgaeyl said nothing, so Xaden dropped it. He had wanted a peek at the feathertail but had been unable to. He heard the others talking about it. He agreed with Kaori that it was probably just curious about what was going on. It wasn’t like the dragons left the Vale like that a lot, and there had to be times that other feathertails had been in the Presentation. Of course, that meant that others had seen one before.
Xaden had wondered for a long time what role the feathertails filled for dragons, but he had never questioned it to the teachers as they would have no idea. Sgaeyl was always silent, so whatever it was, Xaden knew that the dragons were never going to share it with humans. They didn’t need to either. It isn’t like it was needed. They were allowed to live, so that meant there was something there. Dragons didn’t allow weakness, so to let an entire group of dragons survive that couldn’t fight meant that it had to be something.
“Are feathertails the nannies? The ones who nurture the young dragons before they are allowed out to fight?”
Sgaeyl was again quiet, but there was a feeling down the bond that made Xaden think that he was very much on track for something in this. He hoped that things would be going easy the rest of the time. There was a lot to get ready for, and things needed time to settle. Not all dragons knew who they wanted even right then. Sometimes, it was very much a spur-of-the-moment thing. Xaden had never had any doubts about who he was supposed to bond with. Sgaeyl picked him, and it was all that mattered.
There had been no other option, even if he hadn’t known much about her. He was ruthless, and she had made sure that he was worthy by leading him to a few spots to take care of things that needed to be taken care of before she had allowed him to find her.
“And what has you looking like that?” Garrick asked.
“Thinking about our Threshing Day is all. What I went through to get Sgaeyl.”
“It was a fun day. I am not sure I’ve ever had that kind of day like that again. It’s nothing like what is actually going to happen in war, but at least I can say I felt alive that day.”
Xaden followed Garrick to where the last of them were finally leaving the field outside of the meadow. It would be chaos for the next two days until they had this all underway.
“Let’s go eat the better part of a cow,” Garrick said.
—
Xaden had no idea why they were where they were. He looked at Sgaeyl, who was hiding in the trees, and kept an eye on something until he realized that the feathertail was near them. He could see the gold through the trees and even watched as it danced around a little. It was cute; if there was a dragon that could be called cute, it was a feathertail. It was acting like it had no cares in the world. There were no other dragons anywhere near them, so he didn’t have to worry about one of the others stepping on it.
“Her.”
“Sorry, her. Is this the hatchling you and Tairn have been watching over?”
“I’m fond of her, and that’s all you need to know.”
“What do you think will happen that we need to watch over her? You don’t think that any of these cadets would be stupid enough to attack her, do you?”
“I don’t trust humans when it comes to anything that is not considered a weapon of war. Even the healers are used to making sure that your soldiers can keep on going until there is no way to fix them anymore.”
It was jaded as fuck to look at it like that, but it was what it was. There was no other way to look at them. The whole society was built on making more kids to turn into those who could fight. There was barely anything that wasn’t being used in the engine of war, only it was the wrong war.
“There.”
Xaden looked where it felt like Sgaeyl was looking and saw it. He saw Oren and Tynan coming their way. Then there was Violet, who was trying to get there first. From their advantage, there was a lot that he could see. The stupid humans were stupid enough to do something so stupid as killing a dragon.
“Are there dragon laws on this?”
“I will handle it.”
“Handle it in a way that will make sure that no one tries to do anything like it again. Even if feathertails are not fighting machines, they serve a purpose.”
The next ten minutes took forever to Xaden as Violet left too much to chance when it came to fighting them.
He could feel every single emotion from them and their intentions. It was a sea of smugness that wasn’t even going to touch.
“Don’t worry.”
“I’m not worried,” Xaden lied. He knew it was a lie as soon as he said it, but he also knew that Sgaeyl knew he was trying to lie to himself.
Then, a dragon landed that Xaden had only ever seen in brief memories shared by Sgaeyl. The feathertail ran right to him, and then Tynan was dead.
There was no coming back from being burned alive, and Tairn wasn’t going to give that one a single chance to get out of there.
“What are you planning? That would call into question too much, Sgaeyl.”
“She needs someone who will fight for her and my mate bonds too deep and too quick, and things are changing in more ways than you know. We will do what we must, and Tairn will do what he wants. He felt what was happening with the feathertail and refused to let the humans kill her.”
Violet was hurt and bleeding from Tynan’s weapons, but there were no more threats, at least ones that would make themselves known to them at the moment. No one fucked with Tairn, and that was well known.
“No one will take Tairn away from her or the feathertail.”
“Two? Two dragons are going to make it harder for someone to kill her? That’s just nuts. Some of these people would bond a feathertail and call it a day because at least they are a rider!”
Xaden wasn’t sure what would come of this, but putting more attention on Violet wasn’t the way to go with this. Things would be better if she could have bonded with a nice green or a brown. Tairn was going to draw too much attention, much less the feathertail. There was going to be less hiding.
“But you would have even more access to her after that. With her bonded to half of a mated pair, there is a lot of pull to you.”
Xaden knew then that Sgaeyl was hiding more secrets from him than he thought. He knew that things that went on when it came to dragons were going to be secrets, but now there was a secret that impacted him, but he couldn’t say anything about her not telling him. He thought about what it meant that a feathertail had bonded to Violet. There was more going on there as well.
The moment Violet realized that the feathertail was bonded to her was a bit of fun. Sgaeyl shared Tairn’s memory with him just after it happened. A lot was going on with the humans, and Xaden was happy not to be there at the moment. He had a little more time to go where he was, and then they would head down.
“We will go down when I say. You are bonded to me, and I do not answer to anyone.”
“Except for Tairn,” Xaden said.
Sgaeyl ignored him, which Xaden expected.
“The rule follower wants her to reject the bond with Tairn so that she’s not out there flying or doing anything that makes her rider.”
“Of course he does,” Xaden said aloud. He looked around where they were and then moved to mount Sgaeyl. There was no reason for him to do anything but what she wanted, and there were many others in there who would be watching and a lot fewer of the riders who would be coming out of there. The search for anyone left alive would start after the dragons left. Those who chose not to bond didn’t even show up; the others who were undecided before going into the Threshing and chose not to bond would leave when they were sure that no human left was for them.
Codagh was massive, and Xaden hated him, but that was just the kind of dragon he was and what he did to keep the secrets of the humans. Other choices could be made.
“Are you sure about this, Sgaeyl?”” Xaden asked as they landed and looked at where Violet was standing with her two dragons. The humans were still going nuts. Xaden wondered if any of them would actually tell Tairn that he had to give her up or tell the feathertail that.
“Yes.”
It was a connection that Xaden never thought about because it was unheard of for mated dragons to bond with humans of different years. There would have to be concessions about who was going to be going to and from where when Xaden was at the war front, and Violet was still in school, but at least there were weekends when it wouldn’t be the worst for Violet to fly on Tairn. Xaden knew he would have to meet her halfway as well; he wouldn’t let her education drop because of this, which wouldn’t help him at all.
“I never knew I bonded with someone who was soft inside.”
“I’m not.”
Sgaeyl blew air on him before she flew away to be with Tairn as the decision was made about whether to let Violet stay bonded to both dragons.
Chapter Five
Xaden knew that things were going to change. There were a lot of secrets that Tairn and the other dragon, Sgaeyl, had, but in the end, most of them were ones that Violet needed to know. It was time to start to get things in line to pull Violet from Dain and then pull her firmly to his side of things, the rebellion side. The silent one he had been running since long before he got to Basgiath.
“You are going to have to make sure that you tell her the truth and no lies. That’s the only way to keep her to your side from the start. Skirt Brennan for now until we can prove to her that he’s alive. She will never believe you without proof.”
“And Brennan can’t come anywhere near here for now. I know. I’ll think about things and start this weekend when we have fewer eyes on us.” Xaden knew that a lot of things were riding on the fact that he could get her into him. He hadn’t wanted to do much until she had gotten on a dragon, but bonding with Tairn and a second had been nowhere in his head. There was a lot that could have happened between her being shuffled to the scribes like Aetos had wanted. Or even just killed, and while Xaden had made sure that she was already moving closer to him, he hadn’t thrust the blade, as it were.
There was a fine line he had to walk between telling her the truth and keeping things back that he didn’t think she was ready for or what would scare her away. He needed to get closer to her and be vulnerable, which was hard. He was only that way with Garrick, Bodhi, and Laim. Sgaeyl didn’t count on that.
“Thanks.”
“You know exactly why you don’t count. It’s impossible not to be vulnerable with you. You can see everything unless I block you out. What is the reason for bonding when we are just two people who sometimes do what we do?”
Sgaeyl said nothing, as Xaden didn’t figure she would. He rolled to his feet to get out of bed; he had lazed in it for longer than he typically did. He grabbed the needed items to get ready and started that process. He wanted to be put together when he left the room to show that his lateness at getting up was for anything other than he wanted to be late.
His door opened, and it was Garrick.
“Heard you moving about. A second decision was made by the dragons. We are all to be in formation on the flight field, even the unbonded. They will be made to take the stairs. From what I understand, there is going to be a rule added to the codex by the dragons, or they will no longer bond again.”
Xaden made sure to slip extra weapons on his person.
“You were distracting me. What is up?”
“I cannot say.” Sgaeyl sounded like she was a little upset at that.
“I’m going to escort Violet to the flight field. We will be there as soon as possible. Get the rest of them.”
Xaden couldn’t think of a single thing involving Violet that would make this something that would need to be worried about, but Xaden was going to make sure that this wasn’t a chance for someone to kill Violence. Xaden hadn’t called her that nickname to her face yet. He looked forward to it.
The flight field was chaotic when they got up there. Violet was covered in the daggers she had won so far, and Xaden was pretty sure that he would have to make sure she got more daggers as soon as possible.
Panchek was standing in the front of the wings, and he looked pissed off, which was never good.
Xaden put Violet where she was supposed to be and then inspected his wing. He looked at the other wings to see that none of the wingleaders looked like they knew what was happening. One person was missing from the wings, and Xaden wondered if that was a portent of what was coming.
“Yesterday’s Threshing was unprecedented in that we had a rider bond with two different dragons. There was also an infraction that has the dragons of all dens pissed off.”
Xaden swallowed. He knew what this was about, and putting it the next day was better in the long run, but in the end, this would change things.
“A history lesson for those who haven’t been paying attention. Little is known about feathertails, but that doesn’t mean they don’t serve a purpose. I have been told to keep my nose where it belongs as to that purpose, but I am to ask you all a single question: if the dragons saw all weakness as something to be killed off, why haven’t they killed the feathertails?”
Panchek paused, and he looked out among the wings. Xaden saw the dragons creeping closer to them with General Sorrengail standing in the middle of them with Oren in front of her.
“What is going on?”
“Pay attention.”
Xaden looked at where Oren looked smug as fucking hell. He wondered if the idiot thought that he was going to be allowed to bond with Tairn for some reason. He looked more smug than scared, so Xaden didn’t figure that he knew what was coming for him. It was the kind of justice that Xaden knew Oren would never see coming, but the people around him would see it for what it was.
Sgaeyl was right there, ready to roast the fucker alive. Xaden wanted to see it, not even just for trying to kill the feathertail but for what he had planned with the other idiot. The Threshing would have gone differently, and Xaden wondered if he would be latched to Violet for as long as he would be if it hadn’t been for those two idiots. Violet could have bonded any other dragon in here if it hadn’t been for Oren and Tynan.
“Dragons sometimes arbitrate things when it comes to their bonded riders, but mostly, they allow us to police our own and want to do the same. You cannot make decisions on who is allowed to live and die when it comes to dragons.” Panchek paused and looked back at Sorrengail before looking forward again.
Xaden noticed that Oren was starting to look like he was afraid of what would happen. He didn’t look so smug and looked like he might want to run for it. The circle of dragons around him made a lot more sense now. He had been lied to about why he was there, not even told anything, and he just assumed that he would be allowed to take one of Violet’s dragons.
“Who is going to be the one to arbitrate justice here?” Xaden asked.
Sgaeyl didn’t answer.
“Starting today, the Rider’s Codex will have an added clause about the killing of unbonded dragons. That is unlawful unless a clear case is made for defending yourself from one. The dragons will decide if there is a clear case. The death of an unbonded dragon will mean the life of the cadet or rider who does it will be forfeit.”
Oren took off running, and he thankfully ran away from where the riders and cadets were all lined up. Sgaeyl moved, her tail lashing out and taking Oren out at the legs. The blood was visible even from the distance Xaden was at.
“Xaden,” Violet said.
“I can’t do anything, and I wouldn’t anyway. This is up to them. They are the ones who make these decisions, just like we would if a dragon went on a rampage and killed scribes, healers, or infantry. It’s never happened, and we need to respect what they want for their own justice.”
This was something that most of the cadets needed to see. The riders, as well. It wasn’t that the riders were soft, but they had only seen dragons burning a human alive. They had only seen the simple method. The one that dragons didn’t always use when in war.
Sgaeyl came up on Oren as he tried to crawl away. His cries were barely audible where they were, but Xaden figured that First and maybe Second Wing would be able to hear what he said. It would be around the quadrant by the end of the day.
There was no hesitation as Sgaeyl put her foot on Oren. A crushed death like that was painful, and there were going to be a lot of things going on. Xaden hoped that no one would throw up. The other dragons were watching them closely, seeing if there were those in there who couldn’t take it.
“To put it in simple terms, if there is a feathertail in the Threshing ever again, there is no one who will kill them,” Sorrengail said.
Violet made a noise, but she didn’t turn away from where Oren was now dead.
The formation was left where they were as Sgaeyl walked back over to where the other dragons were. Then, the moan of pain wafted down to even them. Xaden felt a little sick to his stomach. She had left him alive to die slowly from the crushing pain.
“There were two who had tried to kill a feathertail; the other one lost his life to Tairn. There is no reason ever to kill a dragon. This is not part of the codex, but I will consider it part of the rules here. If you ever hear someone planning to kill a dragon, tell anyone. We will make sure the claims are valid, and then we will give up the cadet to the dragons to deal with.”
Battle Brief was going to be nothing but questions about this, and Xaden knew it, but he wasn’t sure how much there would be given to them.
“The Empyrean has decided that if something like that were to happen again with a feathertail or even just another dragon that is smaller, we would be deciding if we will bond with a human ever again after that. We power the wards but can do that with whatever we want. We can make sure that the wards are stable, but not do any of this.”
Xaden nodded.
Oren moaned again, then his hand went up and flopped down. They were going to be made to stay where they were until he was dead. This was the point that the dragons wanted. The deaths after would be just as painful and maybe even worse.
—
Xaden wasn’t that shocked to see Violet waiting for him after dinner. The classes that day had been subdued because of what they did. Then there was the fact that many of the unbonded cadets were pissed off about what Oren did to get the wrath of the dragons.
There was more talk of Sgaeyl, but it was well-known how she was. Even other dragons stayed away from her most of the time, but there was no reason to think much of what she had done to Xaden.
“I…regret not killing him now,” Violet said.
“Don’t. You’ll take a life before you leave herein in some way, shape, or form.” Xaden looked around. “You are allowed to be upset about that death, or any death, but only in private. There is no reason to show that kind of weakness to anyone else. I was changed by the first kill I had to make. That’s the way it should be. If someone isn’t changed in some way, they are the ones that need to be watched for. Even the most ruthless of humans need to have some humanity in them, or we are no different than the monsters we fight.”
Xaden debated for a few seconds before he cocked his head to the side and beckoned her to follow him. Garrick and Bodhi saw them and shadowed behind at a distance that would allow them to protect them if needed.
The area where the parapet was was empty. It was pretty much always empty except for conscription day or when people needed to be alone.
“You think the people of Poromiel are monsters?” Violet asked.
“Isn’t that what we are taught?” Xaden asked.
“That’s not an answer.”
“You don’t trust me, and I understand why. We have a common enemy in the people of the world who want what we have.”
“You…have a lot of secrets, don’t you?”
“Yes, and most of them are not mine to tell, no matter how much I might trust you. I have to balance the need to protect others.” Xaden hoped that his protection of her and how he had ensured she was trained as much as he could make her feel like she needed to protect him. It would be hard if she didn’t trust him enough to keep these secrets.
“Did you make them do that?”
“I didn’t make them do anything. I told you that Sgaeyl liked the feathertail, Andarna, right?”
“Yes. You did tell me that I just…why now?”
“From what I know, a feathertail has never been to a Threshing; maybe they don’t want that to happen again if another decides that it wants to watch or bond. They have let the feathertails live for a long time; it’s not like they are useless, which was what Oren and Tynan thought. They don’t get to decide if a dragon who has done nothing lives or dies. I guess that before this, they never thought that a human would even think of killing a dragon like that.”
Violet seemed to calm down a little. She leaned against the wall beside the opening of the parapet.
“Trust is paramount between people here, and in the end, despite wanting to live, we have to trust that those around us will support us when we get out of here. It’s why you are pushed to trust the squad around you,” Xaden said.
“It’s why squad members are limited in the killing they can do. It’s why sleeping cadets are not allowed to be killed.”
“Are all rules in the Codex set down to be about things that have happened?”
“Why would I know?” Violet asked.
“You are the scribe, and while I doubt looking into too much, you had to be one to look at the rules of the codex since you were told about being forced to join here. I know you know the Codex backward and forwards; I figured that also was the history of when things were added.”
“There is not a lot about that in the texts around the Riders Quadrant. Just like the method of death hasn’t been recorded for anyone, there is nothing on each rule as it’s added. I would assume that things were slowly added as there are some truly messed up people who come here who don’t think about what it means to win wars and just want to kill.”
Xaden nodded. He walked over to lean on the other side of the opening. He wasn’t sure what was going through Violet’s head but hated that he felt like he needed to keep his distance when it came to that. He lowered his shields a little and found that she was worried about a lot of things. He shoved them back up and tried to act like he hadn’t felt that.
“Softness is not something that I thought you would feel for her. Are you sure you can do this?”
“I can. Don’t worry.” Xaden knew he was fucked.
Sgaeyl laughed in his head. Xaden really didn’t want to have to deal with his dragon being like this. He wondered what Tairn was like in Violet’s head. The other dragon, Andarna, had to be interesting as well. Tairn was connected to Xaden, but he hadn’t been talkative yet. He knew that would come, so he wasn’t sure if he wanted to draw his attention. Xaden had a block up to make sure that Tairn didn’t hear anything. There was some bleed-through, but in the end, he had no idea what Sgaeyl shared with him.
“I am not sure what I can get away with studying and getting books about, even if I push on the friends I made while training to be a scribe.”
“Don’t push it. It’s not like we need to know. It was just a passing thing in my head. Are you ready for bed yet?”
“No, and I have no clue when I will be. I can’t…I can’t get the sounds of his death out of my head.”
“Sgaeyl is ruthless and dangerous. I knew that from the moment I saw her. She was just there, and I couldn’t help but be pulled toward her. She still hurt me when I was bonding with her. I think you are one of the few who has never been scarred by your dragon during Threshing.” Xaden looked at her arm where the cut was from Tynan. “You also got injured in other ways, so you still spilled blood to bond.”
“I wasn’t even trying to bond with Andarna; I just couldn’t leave them to kill her. It didn’t sit with me. No matter what kind of dragon she is, she’s a dragon. The idea of killing one is antithetical to everything that we have all been taught. The idea that they thought that she was something that it was their right to kill doesn’t sit with me.”
“No, and it seems it didn’t sit with the rest of the dragons either. I know that the people at the college are pissed, but that’s on them. Some things are done that push that kind of thinking before the cadets get there, and they don’t try to curb those thoughts too much before Threshing.” Xaden stepped closer to Violet, and she didn’t step back. He reached out and laid his hand on her arm. “Don’t worry about that sight causing you sleeping issues. There are a lot of riders and cadets from all the years that are going to have trouble sleeping with that sound and sight in their heads. It’s not like it’s something that we see every single day and have it be someone who was around us in classes. We don’t even really see enemies treated like that.”
“I thought he was dead and then moved.”
“Many thought he was dead; it’s why they didn’t move at all. He was a dead man the moment that it was decided that he felt he had the right to kill a dragon. There was no stopping that death.” Xaden thought for a few seconds about the boy he had killed on the parapet. He probably would have jumped at the chance to kill Andarna if he had been there with them.
“I sometimes wonder how many truly smart people we have lost, ones who might have been able to do something to turn the war with Poromiel because of the way that we train dragon riders. I mean, Tairn is considered a badass, and he bonded with me. He chose me. Rhi was chosen. Ridoc. Sawyer. Well, we have soft spots in us, and yet, we were chosen. I mean, I can’t even think how much Ridoc is torturing his dragon with his jokes.”
Xaden laughed. He hesitated and then moved his hand to cup the side of her neck. Violet looked up at him with want in her eyes, but this wasn’t the time for that. There was still so much between them that needed to happen before that part did. Even if she felt like she wanted something like sex. Xaden accepted he was fucked. He didn’t want her to find that kind of release with anyone but him. He had done something stupid as hell and started to fall for her. He needed to deal with so much, and this wouldn’t help him.
“Liam’s here to escort you back to your rooms.”
Violet looked to the side and smiled. Garrick and Bodhi were still hidden to keep hidden the fact that they had been there the whole time.
Xaden only dropped his hand when she moved away from him. He was loathed to do it, but he did. He watched her as she walked to where Liam was. Only once Xaden could no longer hear them did Garrick and Bodhi approach him.
“I thought you didn’t fuck first years?” Garrick asked.
“This is different, and you fucking know it. She’s…nothing like what I thought she was going to be. I wasn’t sure what kind of shit she grew up with, but we both were pretty much abandoned by our mothers.”
“I thought you didn’t hate her for that?”
“I don’t. She was…after everything with Cat, I understand everything a little more. If I had gone through all of that, I would have left as soon as I could. I can’t think about not loving my kid, but I have no clue if my mother ever wanted kids to begin with. Or if she had someone out there, she loved and wasn’t able to be with. I cannot judge her without knowing it all. She left, but there are times I think that maybe leaving might be best for some parents.” Xaden looked out onto the parapet. As much as he couldn’t see how things would be different without Violet there, he wondered if there was ever going to be a part in Lilith’s life where she looked back at what she did to Violet and regretted it. Maybe if she looked at Violet’s body, broken and dead from the way she forced her into the Riders Quadrant.
—
“You and Garrick are best friends,” Violet said as she moved to sit down beside Xaden as he looked up at Andarna lying around with Sgaeyl. It had started out with just Xaden out there then Sgaeyl had arrived, which brought Tairn and then Andarna, then Violet. He didn’t want people around, but there was something about Violet that didn’t make it seem like it was something he was against.
“We are.”
“How do you…deal with the changes that were made because of being here?”
“For us, there were fewer changes. We had already gone through the hard things in life before arriving here. I was trained to be a fighter, and Garrick was as well. I trained Liam to make sure that he didn’t die. Just like I try and make sure as many of us survive as possible. They wanted us dead when they sent us here. Or they thought that our dragons would force us into protecting Navarre.” Xaden winced because the wording wasn’t the best. Violet was smart, and he hoped that she didn’t think about it.
“Is there something bigger than protecting Navarre?”
“I guess that depends on what is out there.”
“You think that there is something else out there?”
“Violet, you know who my father was. You know what you have been told you were fighting for.”
Violet said nothing. She looked up at the dragons again. What looked like a game was really something that Xaden knew was being used to train Andarna. There was a lot that was interesting about the feathertail, and Xaden wondered if she was meant for Violet in more ways than one.
“Told. Not what you were fighting for but what you were told you were fighting for.”
“You value knowledge and proof. I can’t…break promises and give over secrets without asking first. I need you to trust me that there are a lot of things out there that make this something that needs to be handled with care.”
Violet nodded. She looked deep in thought, so Xaden looked up as well.
“What fables did your parents tell you?” Xaden asked a short while later. They didn’t have much time before they had to be in for dinner, but there was time to talk about a few things.
“Dad. It was Dad. He’s the only one who talked about things like that. He told me the same ones that he told Mira and Brennan, only they never were that interested in them. Dad used them as teaching moments, even when we were young. I loved his parables and stories of going for more than one should. Venin and their wyvern were lead stories. He gave me a book before he died. I tried to bring it with me, but Mira stopped me. She only let me bring the book about poisons. I had a pack that was a third of my weight.”
“You would have died. I’m glad she stopped you from doing that. Even back when I was pissed off and wanted to kill you before I saw you, I would have hated to have my foe taken from me like that.”
Violet laughed, and she looked at Xaden. There was a look on her face like Xaden was a puzzle she was trying to figure out. He didn’t know if he wanted her to figure him out or not. He was letting her get closer than anyone else, in some ways even closer than Garrick, Bodhi, and Liam. It was something that he needed to wrap his mind around. How close would he let her get before he revealed it all? He just hadn’t figured out how.
“No one would have expected this, you know,” Violet said.
Xaden knew what she was talking about. He had made sure that no one questioned how he was treating her, but he also knew that many thought he would kill her outright as a fuck you to her mother. The thought had crossed his mind more than once, but he had never felt like it was something he could do.
“No, but then there are a lot of things around you that no one expects. Two dragons, hell, a dragon at all. Surviving to Threshing, surviving Threshing.”
Violet laughed and shoved at Xaden. It was a move that Garrick did often, even Bodhi, but it was something that Violet would never have done before. It felt good, and Xaden tried not to think too much about that.
“So your father told you about venin?”
“And I read about them. The Fable of the Barrens was a book that I read at least a thousand times. It’s something that I wanted to bring with me. To have part of my father with me, but Mira was right that I couldn’t take much more weight than I had on me then. I could do a lot better now. Despite the training that I went through, I’ve gotten better in a lot of things since starting to train with Rhi and Liam and lifting with Imogen. If my mother had been sure about me being able to survive all of this, why didn’t she actually make an effort to train me?”
Xaden knew that Violet was closer to him than she had been, and maybe this was time to open up.
“She wanted you to survive. I am not sure what else she wanted, but…You’ve seen the scars on my back, right? I’ll explain them more one day when I talk about Tyrrendor more. But we have a custom, and she used that to make sure that I would drop dead if one of the other Marked Ones betrayed the country, but the issue is that even at the worst of the apostasy, my father wanted what was best for Navarre, but Navarre is causing a lot of its own issues. I can’t prove that to you yet. I have nothing here that would prove it, and we can’t just leave to go somewhere and do something about it.”
“Then why bring it up?” Violet asked.
“I am not sure. You make me talk about things that I would never normally talk about. The thing with the scars is what I meant to talk about. Your mother made me promise her that I would protect you.”
“What? I thought she wanted me dead.”
“I think that she is messed up, and I think that your…” Xaden had heard a few rumors about things but never thought they were true until General Sorrengail asked him to protect Violet. It was something that he hadn’t fully wrapped his head around. He needed to know more to understand why she was doing what she was doing when it came to Violet. “Your mother loves you, but I think that she is holding a lot of secrets, and those are the reasons why she’s forced you into the Riders Quadrant. It’s also why she asked me to protect you. She had leverage, and that leverage was the best way to protect you. I didn’t expect the rest of this. I didn’t ask Sgaeyl to make Tairn bond with you. I didn’t ask anything like that. It was all to protect Andarna. In the end, we all crashed together in the worst or best possible way.”
Violet was silent. She looked up at the dragons again and then down onto the ground. Her hands weren’t shaking, but there was a storm of emotion inside of her as she couldn’t shield the best still when she was pissed off.
“Why would she not want me in the Scribe Quadrant? Why all of this?”
“We can work on that together. I promise not to lie to you about anything. If I can’t tell you something, I’ll tell you that. I hold a lot of secrets.”
“You said that. I get it. Military family and all. Even my father knew things that he couldn’t tell me.”
“I heard a rumor that your father’s heart issues were not actually heart issues.”
“I heard that once, and my mother went off on the person who said it. She was still grieving as much as I thought she could grieve the death of him. I think they loved each other a lot, but I am not sure if she took part in his death or if it was something that the king and others didn’t want to know. He was researching feathertails, and that was it, as far as I know. He collected fables, but that’s just…fables.”
“Venin were real,” Xaden said. He wondered for a few seconds where that book was now, what Mira had done with it, and if it was still in Violet’s room.
“And they are in the Barrens. I’ve heard all of that before. I wish I had forced Mira to let me keep the book that Dad gave me. Mom might have thrown it out. I went to see her, and in half an hour, she had all of my things boxed up. She’s efficient. I can’t even understand her sometimes. Most of the time.”
Xaden let Violet have her thoughts for a few minutes before they had to get up and head back to where they needed to be. There was a lot to do, and there were a lot of things that Xaden needed to figure out. Like the book that Violet was talking about. He had never heard of it. He wasn’t sure that many had ever heard of it. It had to be on the banned list. So Violet’s father having a copy sounded like it would be at the top of his list of things that needed to be done.
The list was ever-growing.
Chapter Six
Xaden looked out at where Violet and Aetos were talking. Aetos should have been one of the infantry because he was too excitable. Or even in the army, where he didn’t have to make a decision. It had been a month since Threshing, and Violet and Aetos had only been growing more and more apart. Xaden hadn’t even done a thing outside of pointing out to Violet in private that Aetos would never break the rules to save her, while Xaden would.
There had been a moment where Xaden nearly had. Of course, that would have meant killing both of them. Of course, in the end, Oren and Tynan had both died by dragon, as was right. There was a huge divide between Violet and Xaden, and even as he tried to pull her in, he thought that maybe this was what was needed.
Violet spun on her heel and headed toward where Xaden was sitting. Her face had a lot of anger, and he didn’t need to feel her initiation. Aetos rushed up to grab Violet’s arm, and as soon as he grabbed it, she spun on her heels and jerked her hand free. She balled her fist, and for a second, Xaden thought she would haul off and hit him.
Aetos said something, and then there was a feeling of being pissed off across the bond. Before Xaden could do a thing, Sgaeyl landed behind Aetos. Aetos stiffened up, and he didn’t turn. It was like he was playing a game that if he didn’t look, there wasn’t a dragon behind him. Then Sgaeyl reached out and nudged him hard enough that Aetos hit the ground. He rolled onto his back and stared up at the dragon, who could decide to kill him if she wanted.
“Want me to?” Sgaeyl asked.
“No, that will just cause issues.” Xaden wanted her to, though, but that would make things strained between him and Violet, no matter what the relationship was like. Death changed things. It always did. It made relationships seem better than they were. He had seen it happen before. Abusers were looked at as good people just because they died. It was part of why Xaden killed Jack Barlowe as he crossed the parapet, not just because of Violet. Xaden started toward them since Sgaeyl had gotten into the middle of whatever fight was going on.
“What the hell, Riorson!” Aetos yelled before getting to his feet and looking at Xaden’s location.
“He doesn’t control his dragon,” Violet said.
Aetos was full of indignation and was so pissed off that Xaden wouldn’t be shocked if he just burst into flames at some point. It was kind of nice to have his feelings making Xaden not think about Violet. It was all he had been thinking of before Aetos had gotten over to her. Whatever she was doing before he had gotten there was something that involved stretching. It was like she was preparing the spar, but there didn’t seem to be a goal and a few weird moves.
“You are telling me that she just came over to piss me off for no reason?”
“She’s connected with Tairn, and I’ve not gotten the best yet at blocking him out, so he heard every single word you said,” Violet said.
As if his name summoned him, Tairn landed beside Sgaeyl and pinned Dain with a look. There were a few seconds where Xaden thought that Tairn might just eat Aetos. There was something that would have made Xaden happy about that, but again, the whole Aetos being dead didn’t help them in the long run.
Violet knew enough of Xaden’s secrets at this point that if Aetos got his hands on her face, he was going to see everything that Xaden didn’t want him to. Still, it was a risk that he was willing to take because while Violet knew some things, there were not enough to get anyone to do anything about it, not with Sgaeyl with him.
There were a lot of people who thought that the Marked Ones were trustworthy just because they had bonded with dragons. That was kind of stupid since the rebellion had never been about anything more than being proactive in the fight against the venin and less about destroying Navarre. Xaden wanted the Vale and the hatching grounds protected.
“He’s going to end up under my claw one day,” Tairn said.
Xaden snorted as he came to a stop where Violet and Aetoes were. He looked at Sgaeyl and smiled at her before he nodded at Tairn. He wasn’t sure what Tairn’s full name was, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to know what it was. There were a few names that he thought it could be, but he understood the reasoning behind keeping the names for just the rider and the dragon.
“I was trying to tell Violet that she needs to be more careful being out here alone like she was,” Aetos said.
“I was out here. Tairn was close enough that as soon as Sgaeyl landed, he started to fly to her.”
“You can’t protect her from back there.”
“I can protect myself.”
“She can, and even if I couldn’t get there physically, my shadows are faster than me. There is no reason to try and take her on when I’m around like that, and even the most stupid of the first years left would know that. There is being her and dying just from being in the classes, and then there is a death wish, and as much as we know that a few want to kill her for being weak in their eyes, they aren’t going to where I’m around. Tairn bonds deep, and that means that I risk my death if she dies. I’m not going to risk that, no matter what the rules state. Despite me being her rider, even Melgren doesn’t want to lose Sgaeyl. They aren’t going to care what happens when I protect Violet to make sure that Tairn doesn’t die and take out Sgaeyl at the same time.”
Aetos looked like he wanted to refute that, but the Codex was the rules they followed, and there were parts about protecting mated pairs of dragons to make sure that there wasn’t a loss of both of them. Despite fewer dragons bonding each year, there was still the chance that those alive would bond at some point if the war turned. It was going to, and Xaden knew it. It felt like things were on edge.
“You can’t trust him with your life, Vi.”
Xaden saw it. The little flinch at the name. There were others who called her Vi sometimes, but Xaden only called her Violet or Violence. The nickname worked well for her. He wondered if the name of Vi was tainted coming from Aetos now. It was a good thing that it was happening now. There was a lot that Xaden still had to do, but he didn’t need to push too much. Before Threshing, Aetos had plans to get her to the scribes for her own safety. There was not a lot that could be done about it now that she had a dragon.
“I am not sure I trust you on that,” Xaden said.
“Shut up and leave,” Aetos said.
“Ah, is that any way to speak to your wingleader? You are the one who was going to get her killed. There might not be anything in the rules about what you were trying to do about getting her into the scribes, but if you think that she doesn’t have spies all around in here, with professors and maybe even other third years, that would have told her mother the moment she was not in classes anymore, you are even more stupid than I thought you were.”
“Xaden,” Violet said.
“No. Look, you can’t tell me you haven’t thought about that Violence. He was going to try and hide you away in the scribes when all it would get done was your mother looking for you. It’s not like you would have gone that far. There was no way to keep you safe from the moment your mother decided that you had to be here. You are no different than the rest of the rebellion kids. You were forced into the one place that was supposed to be volunteer-only. Your mother protested the killing of our parents in front of us, but this was all part of her design. She knows that she’s sullying the honor of the Riders Quadrant with forced conscription.”
“Is that what he’s been feeding you? You are just like the rebellion kids? You are more than they will ever be, Vi,” Aetos said.
“No, I’m not because at least they give a shit about me. You were coddling me too much. I’ve gotten so much better that I don’t have to worry about challenge days. I just have to be the best I can be. Liam’s been teaching me.”
“And guarding you. Xaden’s making sure that he’s got eyes on you at all times. Why can’t you see how horrible he is?”
“And are you any better?” Xaden asked.
Sgaeyl growled, and another snout moved in, and Tairn knocked Aetos away from Violet.
“You are being turned into someone I can’t be friends with anymore, Violet,” Aetos said.
“That’s okay. I thought being here with you was the best thing in the world. You are the best friend I’ve ever had, but you are right that being here changes people. I realized how strong I am and how much I want this. I want to be a rider. It was never an option before because I felt like I wasn’t ever going to do it, but I am here. I’ve done it. The dragons didn’t kill me, so that means that they see something inside of me that is worthy of them. I was chosen by the best dragon that wasn’t even on offer. I don’t care about anything but being the best, and Xaden’s been helping me be the best instead of you holding me back all the time.”
Xaden almost said something, but he kept the words to himself. It was like Aetos didn’t care about anything but making sure he was the one that shined. He knew that wasn’t the truth, but it would put another hole in their bond. Aetos loved her. Xaden could see it in every single bit of emotion that he could feel from the man. If Xaden were anyone else, he would feel bad about how this was going, but Dain had mostly done all the work of pushing Violet away from him on his own. It was like the man hadn’t realized that he was trying to drown her, and she was just fighting back. She fought back right into Xaden’s arms, but that was understandable. Xaden had made sure that it happened.
“You are going to regret this,” Aetos said.
“No, Dain, I’m not because Xaden’s right. If I had done what you wanted and left, I would be dead. I doubt even Tairn would want me if I had tried to leave and got caught and thrown back here under more threats than before. I want to be your friend, but I can’t be friends with someone who is constantly telling me that I can’t do what I know I can do. If you grow up, let me know.”
Violet didn’t even look at Xaden as she walked over to Tairn and climbed up on him, setting herself down. Xaden was glad he got to see how she got up on him, and it would help him with the saddle he had been thinking about making for her. He knew from Sgaeyl about the issues with her being unable to stay on Tairn because her legs were too small and weak. She was getting better and staying on Tairn longer before falling, but there was no way she wouldn’t fall off in battle, and then Tairn would have to worry about her. There were a lot of things that needed to be handled and taken care of. There was also the fact that Xaden knew that for the sake of Tairn, the saddle and its hardness would need to be something that Tairn could get on and off himself. There was no way the dragon could consent to anyone but Violet and maybe even Xaden helping with that. It was, of course, going to be hard to get done, but Xaden had his thoughts about it and what could be done to make sure that it happened.
“You are going to get her killed,” Aetos said.
“This war is going to get her killed. She’s going to have to learn how to figure out what she can do and what she can’t. She can’t know her limits unless she tries them. You want her to be the weakest she can be because you think that it’s going to save her. Being weak will never save her. Her mother made sure that she was going there. You can’t tell me that you don’t hate Lilith Sorrengail for that. Violet would be safe in the Scribe Quadrant if it weren’t for her, but you are delusional if you think that she didn’t make sure that Violet stayed where she put her.”
“You really think that General Sorrengail would kill her kid?”
“I think that she made her join the quadrant that, from all appearances, would kill her from the start. There is no reason to send her daughter through Riders Quadrant other than to kill her. That she survived is just luck. Lilith Sorrengail’s pride at the Sorrengails being riders is what pushed her to put her daughter through this. Do not blame me for making sure that she lives.”
“You really see her as one of you,” Aetos said.
“I mean, we were treated the same. Lilith Sorrengail made sure of that. No one should be forced into something.”
“She loves her,” Aetos said.
“You keep on telling yourself that.”
Xaden turned to follow where Violet went. He knew that he needed to be there to deal with Violet’s issues. Aetos wasn’t going to be allowed around for a while, but maybe it would teach Aetos about how to treat someone that you loved.
Xaden knew that things were strained between a lot of the first years since none of them knew what to make of the death they had seen in front of them caused by a professor to a rider. Xaden had seen it before, and it was why he and Sgaeyl had worked so hard to make sure that no one knew he was a variety of inntinnsic. It was a death sentence that Xaden wanted to make sure never happened to him.
—
Sgaeyl felt like a hug in his mind while Tairn felt like a blunt force object, and it woke up Xaden from a dead sleep when the dragon pushed through the wall in his head. Xaden locked himself down as he tried to understand what was going on. Tairn was too freaked out, and it took images of five students in Violet’s room with the intent to kill her for Xaden to get off Sgaeyl and make it as fast as he could to Violet, of all nights for it to happen. The little sleep he got on Sgaeyl’s back wouldn’t be enough for the night, but he would do anything to save Violet.
“Violet’s room!” Xaden screamed as Garrick and Bodhi landed.
The only thing that Xaden understood was that Tairn knew before Violet. He wanted to know how, but he also hated that he hadn’t made sure that no one could get into her room. He was going to be fixing that as soon as possible. There was one thing that Xaden knew: that lesser magic had been used to open the door, and that meant that there was at least one more out there who had let the unbonded into the room. He had trusted that the cadets wouldn’t break the rules that were sacred to all of them. He wouldn’t make that mistake again.
“Faster.”
Xaden pushed himself even harder as he took the stairs so fast that a mistake would possibly mean his death. Tairn’s voice left nothing for him to do but what the dragon demanded.
“Keep her alive until I get there.”
Xaden made it onto the floor, and there was no one around, no lookouts. The unbonded had been stupid about this. Xaden didn’t even stop as he slammed into the door. He had a few seconds to take in the room, and then Violet was tucked into him. He looked at her and then to the room where the unbonded were all still facing where Violet had been. She had gotten a few good digs in with the daggers she had. He snapped his fingers, and the mage lights came to life.
“You’re all fucking dead.” Xaden grabbed them with his shadows. There was no need to let them get a shot off with a dagger.
Yet all of them dropped their weapons—even the one with the sword in hand.
“Surrendering isn’t going to save you. You broke the code, and I’m going to make sure that you don’t get to do it again.”
“That dragon never should have bonded her,” one of them screamed.
“Dragons don’t make mistakes. That’s what you didn’t learn from Panchek and Oren’s death. Dragons don’t make mistakes. They do what they want but don’t tell us what they look for in the human they bond with. You all make the mistake of letting your own thoughts overrule the facts. Xaden wound the shadows around their throats and started to squeeze. Violet was trembling beside him, and he wanted to do something to comfort her, but right now, it was too much of a mistake.
Xaden darkened the hallway. He didn’t need anyone coming up behind them, like the one who let them into Violet’s room. Violet had to have seen that person.
“Who let you in?” Xaden asked as he turned to the girl Violet had gotten with a dagger. Her arm was useless and bleeding. He wrapped a shadow around her shoulder and squeezed, using the paint to push her to answer hopefully. “It’s not going to save you, but I can make the death quicker, less painful.” Xaden used his shadow to pick up a discarded dagger.
Xaden barely heard the whispered first name before he sliced her throat. The others were long dead.
“Damn, Xaden.”
Xaden didn’t jump because while he knew the voice, he had felt Garrick getting closer and moving through the shadows; Bodhi was right behind him.
“Get them out of here,” Xaden said before they could say anything else. Xaden felt like an idiot for not making sure that Violet was safe at all times. Liam would start to follow her around more than he was now. This wasn’t going to go well for anyone. “Call in help if you need it.”
Violet was in shock, and Xaden knew it. This was the kind of thing that normally happens much later when they had been trained to go through it. He started to go through Violet’s armoire to make sure that she had clothes. She wasn’t sleeping in her room since the door was undoubtedly broken with how Xaden had hit it. There was also the blood and bodies. The death roll would need to be updated, and someone who knew the unbonded were would need to make sure that their names were on there. It was one time that Xaden wished that it was read off how someone died.
“Thank you,” Tairn said.
“You are breathing for shit, so tell me what is wrong,” Xaden said.
“My ribs. I was nearly killed by the sword. I think they are just bruised.”
‘Must have been dull, and a rider having a dull sword is not something I could ever see. Unless you want to tell me why you sleep in your leather vest.”
Xaden knew she was conflicted about something, so he waited. There would be a moment where Violet trusted him or she didn’t.
“It’s dragon-scale. Mira made it for me. It’s why I’ve lived this long.”
“There are a lot of reasons you have lived this long, Violence.” Xaden looked at her throat to see where one of them had tried to choke her before he got there. That one should have died slower, but Xaden hadn’t been there to see who had done it.
Xaden checked her over, and he knew the moment that she realized that they were all dressed, and it was two in the morning. She didn’t ask, though. Still, Xaden distracted her with a conversation about how she got into it. Which was the worst thing as Xaden knew what was wrong with her but he hadn’t learned so much of the fine detail. Of course, there were times when being that flexible might just save her life or give her good orgasms.
Trying to banish that thought, given what she was dressed in, Xaden waited for Bodhi and Garrick to come back before he got them out there. He needed to get her boots on her, and she was still in shock.
“It’s time to stop acting like you don’t care for her, not if you want her to understand your reasons for what you have done and the moment they moved from doing something that was neat to hurt her mother into something that was meant to keep her alive.”
Xaden buttoned Violet’s cloak, and he hesitated before he brushed his palm down the side of her face. Then he repeated it with the back of his hand. She looked at him and while it was a good time, it was the worst time, given how much in shock she was and how much things were not good.
No one else was awake; the noise of the attack hadn’t woken anyone up. Hell, it had been easy to muffle what he had done. There had been no yelling.
“Where are we going?” Violet asked when we were in the tunnel. She didn’t even ask for light; she just allowed me to escort her where we were going. The shock had to be worse than Xaden thought.
“To talk to Tairn. I want to know how they got into your room.”
Xaden felt the feeling from her about that. There was little she could hide right now, and Xaden didn’t even have to try to read her. She was giving off a lot despite her shock.
Amber Mavis wasn’t going to live the day.
—
Xaden was still in shock about what Andrana could do when breakfast came out the next morning. There was a lot about the feathertail that Xaden knew was being kept from them. Xaden also felt like there was a reason why she was bonded to Violet when no other feathertail was ever allowed out. It was less that she was inquisitive and curious and more that she had a plan. The biggest thing was that Sgaeyl and Tairn knew some things, but Xaden felt like they didn’t know as much as they should about Andarna.
The fact that feathertails were baby dragons made a lot more sense on why they added the rule to the Codex. If it came up to riders like Jack, Oren, Tynan, and the others who had tried to kill Violet the night before, Xaden knew that they would have killed every single feathertail and would feel justified in it. That would be a generation of dragons who never made it to adulthood. There was more going on about Andarna than Xaden and Violet had been told. That a child had been allowed to bond with Violet made Xaden think that things were being kept from Sgaeyl and Tairn as well, which was a little wrong given that it seemed they had pretty much raised Andarna. Codagh was the one who allowed the Right of Benefaction for Andarna, so they thought that she was a black dragon; Xaden knew that. It was something that Violet might not know, and no one had told her much of things, but Sgaeyl told him a lot of things she wasn’t supposed to.
Xaden had confirmed the name with Violet of the person who had let the unbonded into her room. That was going to be a big deal when everyone else was gathered. There was a lot that needed to be done since Amber was a Wingleader. For a few seconds, Xaden wondered if Amber was jealous. She and Aetos had been close until Violet had entered the quadrant. Then things had changed. There was a good chance they had been more than that, but Xaden had never gotten the actual word on that. He had hoped that something would come out of following Aetos, but the boy had been a rule follower from the start. Given who his father was, Xaden wasn’t shocked about that. He was shocked to learn a little more about the way things were with Aetos Senior and General Sorrengail. Xaden was also sure that Aetos Senior would be a pain in Xaden’s side going forward. It was something that would be a big deal at some point.
This was going to be the moment that their relationship changed for Aetos and Violet. For the ill. There was no way that Aetos wasn’t going to support Amber. Ever since Presentation Day, Amber had been pissed about Violet winning the argument about how Violet got up the Gauntlet. It was poetic, really, that Amber had crossed one of the rules she loved so dearly to take out someone. It wasn’t a shock that she had run. She was a coward at the end of the day. This was something that Xaden needed to handle a little differently than he normally would. He just wanted to call her out and deal with it, but there needed to be a show that Violet was his. That would make sure she was safe.
Xaden waited for the death roll to be finished, and then Fitzgibbons stepped back to have Panchek step up. This was a change, so everyone, even the first years, was paying attention. Panchek was livid, but he wasn’t showing it. He was holding the Codex in his hands.
“Vi?” Aetos asked as he stared down Violet. It wasn’t going to work the way that Aetos wanted it. He had been pushing her more and more away from him in the name of love.
Violence, Rhiannon, and Ridoc were talking, and then Aetos snapped at them to shut the hell up. Aetos knew that something was up and it would not be good.
Xaden headed up to join Panchek on the dais.
“Early this morning, a rider in my wing was brutally, illegally attacked in her sleep with the intent of murder by a group primarily composed of unbondeds.” Xaden paused to let the chatter die down after that remark.
Xaden went on to explain what happened the night before, the six names that people knew hadn’t died during any of the classes, the new name that will be added to the death roll. There was a lot of chatter after that, and Xaden knew it would be a fight to get everyone to agree, at least outside of the wingleaders. It wasn’t like any of them really questioned Xaden, and Amber had been loud about how upset she was about Threshing and Violet going up the Gauntlet.
The dragons’ arrival shocked many of them, but Xaden knew it was needed. The wingleaders’ dragons, Panchek’s dragon, and Tairn. It was only a blessing that Tairn had made Andarna stay in the Vale. Xaden didn’t pay much attention to Aetos and regretted it when Dain reached for her head. Xaden stepped down and was half the distance between them when Violet slapped Dain on the cheek. Tairn exhaled a massive breath of hot air that made a few other riders escape the path between Tairn and his rider.
“Do not ever touch me like that again, Dain,” Violet said, her tone seething. She had both of her hands on daggers. It was going to be a bloodbath.
“Show me! You didn’t see what you did. You couldn’t have.”
“You are calling me a liar?” Violet asked.
Dain hesitated for a few seconds, but then he stood up straighter. “Yes.”
“Well, I guess then we are at an impasse if one of my squad leaders doesn’t trust my word or the word of the rider who reported it to me. Someone let the unbonded into her locked room. None of them have lockpicking skills, and the doors are all pretty well guarded against that. So it was a rider who had control of their lesser magics. If it wasn’t Mavis, who was it, Dain? You seem to know more about the truth of this than anyone else. Were you part of it? Just wanted to scare her enough to make sure that she did what you wanted from now on?”
“What are you talking about, Riorson?” Panchek asked.
Xaden looked at Violet; she nodded, and then he looked back at Panchek.
“As you know, Aetos and Sorrengail have been friends for years. Even at Threshing, he was trying to convince her to go to the scribes where she would be hidden from her mother. Then, after Threshing, he tried to bully her into taking just Andarna.”
“Cadet Aetos?”
“It was safe for her, sir,” Aetos said through gritted teeth.
“Why were you trying to use your signet on a squadmate?” Panchek asked.
“Amber could never do that, sir. She is a rule follower like I am.”
“And yet, you were trying to break the rules of this place to save your friend. Maybe moving him to squads would be good. Moving Cadet Sorrengail would seem like she was being punished for the actions of someone else.”
“I can handle him,” Violet said.
“That may be, but I think he’s earned a break.”
“Or a demotion,” Xaden said.
“We will discuss with the other wingleaders and make a decision, but first, we need to deal with Cadet Mavis.” Panchek looked at her.
Pancheck turned on his heel and headed back up to the dias before looking out at them.
“What about a memory?” Violet asked.
“To what? Stop them from thinking you are lying?” Xaden asked.
Sgaeyl sounded a little upset, but Xaden saw it in his head a few seconds later. Just like the dragons and the rest of the cadets did. The bit of the attack where Violet woke up and rolled out of the way of the sword before she looked to see Amber running from the room. It was the kind of thing that made Xaden sing in happiness. He wasn’t sure what Violet said to make Tairn show that, but he also understood that without it, there was every chance that this could turn to where one day, someone would demand that Violet show the memory, and there was no telling what they would see. There were too many secrets that were shared between Violet and Xaden not to make sure that they were safe. It was fully mutually assured destruction.
“We need to change up what we are doing,” Tairn’s voice was rough in Xaden’s head, much like he assumed Sgaeyl’s was in Violet’s.
Xaden agreed that things were changing now that there were more secrets that Violet would need to keep quiet. There was a lot of risk, but Aetos had been the biggest risk. This would be the biggest risk he took in a while, but maybe the next time they do a run somewhere, Xaden could pull her along. He knew it was a risk, but there was so much that was already at risk. It was sink or swim time. Xaden needed to talk to a lot of them, and now that Liam had a dragon, things would be changing as well. It was a perfect time to make sure that Violet was always protected. She wouldn’t have to worry about Aetos going after her to get anything from her.
Everything depended on this going well, and if he wanted to make sure that everything did go well, he needed to pull her the rest of the way inside. The threat to hear had grown being attached to him, and he had been blind. He could see it now how a few words here or there might make someone want to take care of a threat that they saw. Violet wasn’t the threat, but she was the way to get to the threat.
Xaden stepped over to where Violet was and stayed beside her as Tairn got ready to deal justice for what was done to his human.
“This needs to be done,” Xaden said. He knew Violet had to fight it with Tairn, but this was justice.
“She…”
“She made her choice knowing that she was breaking a rule. Like the other humans, she thinks that she knows better than dragons what they want, and this is another bit of proof that he’s not going to tolerate someone coming after you.”
Xaden wasn’t used to the heat from Tairn. Tairn was powerful, but this was something else. Much needed to be taken care of to ensure that Tairn didn’t have to burn half of Violet’s year alive, but this was a good step in that direction.
Justice was served.
