Iron Flame (Chapter 35)
STATS
Title: Iron Flame
Series: The Empyrean (Book 2)
Author(s): Rebecca Yarros
Genre: Fantasy (Epic)
First Printing: November 2023
Publisher: Red Tower Books
Rating: 1/10
SPOILER WARNING
Heavy spoilers will be provided for the entire story up through the end of the content covered in this part. Mild spoilers for elements later in the story may be provided, but I will keep the first paragraph of each section as spoiler-free as possible. Heavy spoilers from later in the book will be confined to clearly labelled sections.
STORY
Violet wakes up in an interrogation cell. Nolon and Draconis are summoned to talk to her. What follows is a brief yet frustrating interrogation, which mercifully ends when Draconis resorts to torture.
Over the next few days of torture, Violet hallucinates that Liam is in the cell with her. He validates and encourages her. During one of the torture sessions, Varrish taunts Violet, telling her that she is the bait he will use to lure in Xaden.
Draconis finally brings Dain in to interrogate Violet. Dain does as ordered and reads Violet’s memories. Violet, possessing an inexplicable and not previously established understanding of mind-reading Signets and a mastery of psychic combat, drowns him in memories of the climax of Fourth Wing. Dain ends the mind-reading by giving an over-wrought speech about how Violet deserves what she’s about to get, asks Draconis to hand him a dagger, and then proceeds to stab Draconis with said dagger. Before Violet can fully process what just happened, Xaden enters her cell, having slaughtered his way through the prison to rescue her.
PLOT
Given how little I’ve just described, it may not sound like Yarros has pulverized the shards of her story into even smaller pieces. Rest assured, she manages the task. It is truly impressive how she manages to do such thorough damage in so little time.
I will be referencing the heist from Chapters 32 through 34 at multiple points throughout this section. As promised last week, you do not need to have read my comprehensive heist breakdown to understand what follows. I will summarize the relevant details as they come up.
Before we get into it, I think it’s important that we refresh our memory of one of the many toggles Yarros has been flipping throughout this book: the riders’ stance on due process.
Due Process
We were told, as early as Chapter 2 of Fourth Wing, that the riders do not believe in due process. They don’t wait for trials. They punish wrongdoing promptly. We are later shown this when Amber is executed based on nothing but Violet’s word, with Tairn vouching for her (because, ultimately, the wingleaders who judged and sentenced her had no way to verify that Violet’s “memory” was real, versus being a dream or a fantasy). This is doubled down upon in Iron Flame when a rider is executed on Markham’s orders for … following the rules and not knowing that a missing document was classified information. Yarros wants us to believe that there is danger present, that the slightest mistake could cost Violet everything, that nothing can save her once she’s arrested.
Every time Draconis enters the picture, but in this interrogation scene in particular, we are told that riders have privacy rights and must be proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt (and, as Chapter 4 showed us, not even that is necessarily enough).
This is pathetic. The story twists in whatever direction is needed for Yarros to pretend there is a threat while keeping Violet out of genuine danger. It makes this chapter feel incredibly limp.
The Interrogation
The Capture
“I wanted to be wrong,” [Nolon] says gently. “But Markham had sounded the alarm that the royal wards within the king’s private library had been breached, and then I saw you standing in the courtyard with a scribe’s satchel -”
It was established the Violet and Aaric entered the king’s private library 40 minutes before the Archives closed. How were the Archives not swarmed by Draconis, Bad Teachers, other riders loyal to the rider leadership, infantry, and scribes in that 40 minute window? With as small as Basgiath is described as being, even 15 minutes would be a rather slow response time. There is no way that Violet and her cohort should have made it out of there alive, let alone without resistance.
Or does Yarros mean to imply that only the warded pedestal that housed the journals was rigged with the alarm? If so, why? Given that the journals were hidden from view under a tablecloth, thieves would potentially never know they were there, allowing the whole library to be pilfered without that alarm being triggered.
Come to think of it, WHY would Markham be alerted that the wards were “breached”? Aaric unlocked the wards. That was his entire narrative purpose. Shouldn’t the alarm have been disabled by his involvement?
Disregarding all of that, how was Nolon prepared to sedate Violet? He gets her to drink from a pewter mug of lemonade that he laced with sedative (and the Signet-suppressing elixir, judging by the fact Violet loses her connection to Tairn before she passes out). Did he just have these things on hand? Nolon hasn’t been established to be adept with poisons - or, for that matter, drugs of any kind. Mending is a wholly magical ability. Violet didn’t even learn her poisoning skills from him.
To once again draw a parallel to a much better story, not even Maomao from Apothecary Diaries just casually walks around with poison to drug people at a moment’s notice. (Granted, Maomao would probably ingest any such poison herself, but the point stands.) Every time Maomao does have a drug on hand, it was prepared in advance to address a specific problem (an emetic for when she anticipates an ingested poison, strong booze to incapacitate a man she knows to have a weak constitution, etc.). Nolon does not have the established knowledge or proclivities for this to make sense.
Contrived Failure
Damn it. We were stupid for not assuming tripping the wards would alert Markham.
After everything that Yarros has done to hype of Violet’s rationality, cleverness, and overall intellect, I do not believe for an instant that Violet would not have considered this possibility, let alone that her entire team (who have previously had the knowledge she lacked) would miss it. The only way that them not considering it makes sense is if it is something that was actually impossible for them to anticipate. This is why I brand Violet’s arrest as a contrivance. There were so many ways the heist should have failed, yet THIS way, a way that either should have been accounted for or else was impossible to account for it, was the only one that it did.
Unidentified Suspects
“Three questions.” Nolon shoots a stern look in Varrish’s direction. “We want to know how you did it, who you did it with, and most importantly, why.”
The boulder in my throat loosens, and I fill my lungs completely, willing my panic to subside. They don’t know who, which means no one else is chained up here. Not Xaden, or Rhiannon, or Aaric, or any of the others. It’s just me.
Xaden should absolutely be arrested, or at least, be the target of orders to have him arrested. This isn’t rocket science.
The night of the heist was one of his nights of regularly scheduled leave to visit Basgiath.
Dragons could testify that he left Basgiath immediately after the heist.
He is the son of the man who led the last revolution against Navarre, a man who is himself already suspected of treason against Navarre, and the lover of the woman found in possession of a classified document.
Also, let’s not forget that, during the heist, they had to assault the two guards in charge of the vault. This means that:
Since Imogen will be on record as having a Signet that wipes memories, and since she is a rebel child with known ties to Xaden, she would also be arrested and interrogated when the guards reveal that they can’t remember who attacked them.
The one person who can provide Imogen with an alibi, Quinn, has a Signet power that is also on record and that would invalidate any alibi she presents. She would also be arrested and interrogated.
Jesinia should also be arrested. She was the one who got the information on the defenses for this private library. Given that the library’s very existence was classified, she really should have been arrested merely for asking questions about it, but now that it has been breached, she should absolutely be the prime suspect.
Truth or Dare
We now come to the truly infuriating part of the interrogation, wherein Violet … outsmarts … Draconis and his associate, the latter of whom has a Signet to detect lies (the “truth-sayer” Signet, as it is called).
It is common sense that the way to bypass a lie detection power is to tell subjective truths. (That technically shouldn’t work here, given how the Signet is established to function, but I will get into that below.) It should therefore also be common sense that anyone using such an ability would not take any answers presented at face value, especially if the truth-sayer knows that the subject is aware of this ability (and the truth-sayer in this instance told Violet about the gift twice, once during the second RSC exercise and again here). The trick in these situations is to hammer the subject with the same question from multiple angles, rephrasing it and following up with clarification questions. Requiring the subject to answer binary yes / no questions accelerates the process. Eventually, using subjective truths will fail. The subject will be caught in a lie, the subjective truths can be compared to reveal the objective truth, or the truth will become visible by the ever-shrinking holes of omitted information.
Draconis and his goons instead choose to take Violet at her word the first time that she answers each question. What’s more, they don’t even choose to jump to any of the reasonable conclusions that one would jump to if one did take Violet’s answers at face value.
First, we get this gem.
“Let’s start with how you breached a royal ward,” Varrish suggests.
“I would be impossible for me to breach a royal ward, seeing as I’m not royal.”
Just a few follow-up questions, off the top of my head:
Did you enter the royal library?
Did you cross through a royal ward on the night of the heist?
Were you in the Archives or the private library sublevel during the hour before the Archives closed?
Did you witness someone entering the royal library?
Do you know any individual with the ability to breach a royal ward?
The logical assumption here is that Violet has a royal helping her. They should, at this point, immediately contact the king to verify whether he or his heirs visited Basgiath in secret. A swift investigation would reveal Aaric’s involvement, especially if someone familiar with the king comes to Basgiath to check (since, as Yarros chose to establish in Chaper 32, the family resemblance between Aaric and his father is so obvious that Jesinia, a random scribe with no prior association with the royal family, knows who Aaric really is at first sight).
Then there’s this.
“And yet we have the fucking journal.” Varrish walks a slow circle around me. “Is it a reproduction?”
He’s trying to catch me in a lie.
“I wouldn’t know, seeing as I haven’t examined it.”
Again, follow-up questions, off the top of my head:
Did this journal we found in your possession come from within the royal library?
Did you go to the Archives with the intention of retrieving either the original journal or a reproduction?
The logical assumption here is that Violet wanted classified information. Her response implies that she intended to examine it. Whether or not it is a reproduction is irrelevant.
You all remember what happened to a rider who merely requested information that he couldn’t know was classified through official channels, right?
Oh, and let’s not forget this:
“Who stole the book for you?” He looks pointedly at my hands. “Because we both know you didn’t.”
Selective truth. That’s all I have within my arsenal to protect my friends.
“I alone put that particular book into its bag.”
Did you put it into the bag while inside the private library?
Did you remove the book from its pedestal?
Were you alone in the private library?
Did a member of the royal family give you access to the private library?
Logical conclusions:
Violet did not act alone.
Violet just confessed to stealing this classified document.
There was ways to do compelling exchanges of intrigue and half-truths when a character is incapable of lying. This is not one of them. Even the Inheritance Cycle, a series that I feel has a severe lack of subtlety, managed to get this right. The one time we are shown Eragon using subjective truth to lie in the Ancient Language is when he tricks Arya into thinking that he’s no longer pining after her. She directly asks him if he’s feeling better, referring to him being hurt that she rejected him, and he tells her that he’s feeling better, thinking about his back pain. This works because (A) Eragon phrases his response in a manner that actually sounded like an answer to Arya’s question, thereby not inviting any follow-ups and (B) Arya really doesn’t want to tear open that wound, so when he tells her what she wants to hear, she has a strong motivation to take him at his word.
Royal Secrets
“I’m guessing you have no proof, Major Varrish, because none of you can cross a royal ward, and no one is volunteering to tell the king that there’s been an alarm, false or otherwise.”
Why not contact the king? What can he possibly do to the dragon riders? They have all the power here, as Yarros has repeatedly reminded us.
Execution Without Trial
“And I’m done answering your questions. If you want to put me on trial, then call of quorum of wingleaders and do so according to the rules put forth in the Codex.”
This is a very stupid move on Violet’s part. Of the five wingleaders, Dain is the only one who’s arguably on her team, and she has gone out of her way to spite him. She was found in possession of classified documents, and she just confessed to being the only one involved with said classified journal, which is effectively a confession to having stolen it. They have everything they need for the trial to end in her -
Oh, wait. That’s right. There is the not-so-small matter of one of the first things Yarros chose to establish about the Riders Quadrant.
“We don’t wait for trials around here. We just execute.”
Violet isn’t asking for a trial by her peers. She is asking to be sent directly to the firing squad.
Not very “fucking clever”, is she?
Literally all Draconis has to do is announce that she has confessed to treason and must be pumped for information on her co-conspirators, and the wingleaders will accept it and move on. He can continue to torture her at his leisure. If this lures Xaden back for revenge, so much the better.
Mark of Shame
“Nora, order an immediate formation and check the hands of every cadet in the quadrant,” Varrish says as I blink through the sting.
Wards have been established, multiple times, to function as solid walls. Aaric indicates in Chapter 33 that the private library wards should also function this way. How, then, does Varrish know to look for someone with burned hands? Has he already figured out that there is a royal heir among the riders? If so, why not call in someone who has met the king before (or, you know, any random scribe) and ask them to check the faces of the riders?
Torture
Perhaps the only good things in this chapter come during the torture sequence. It’s also where the truly plot-breaking stuff happens, but let’s start with the positives.
Rated PG-13
Unlike with the second RSC exercise, I feel that the handling of torture in Chapter 35 actually manages to convey the seriousness and gravity of the situation. It also manages to do this without graphic detail.
A big help here is that Yarros doesn’t show us trained fighters overreacting to a few blows to the head. She doesn’t set the bar for “torture” at a pathetic low. Instead, she shows us Violet’s suffering in the aftermath of the torture sessions and gives us a general idea of the injuries she’s suffered. This gives us a sense of weight without needing to go into detail about the torture directly.
As mentioned way back in the prelude, I think it’s clear that Yarros didn’t want to subject the audience to graphic descriptions of violence and suffering. I think she’s successful in this regard. The torture sequence is dark, but not overwhelmingly so. The average reader, who will have already made it this far in the series, should be able to handle it. I also don’t think it’s fetishistic in its descriptions of suffering. We are told just the right amount to understand what Violet is going through.
Validating Ghost
Violet hallucinating Liam annoyed me on a first read. I’m not a huge fan of a character getting emotional support from a ghost who is ultimately just a figment of his or her imagination. The support just feels incredibly empty. Kylo Ren imagining that Han Solo forgives him for the deaths of billions of people is what Kylo wanted to believe, not something he earned. Oliver Queen getting a “You are a hero” pep talk from his hallucination of Tommy Merlyn in Season 2 of Arrow felt like something Oliver really should have been able to figure out on his own. That’s not to say that such ghosts can’t be compelling characters or feed into great character development - Mallorie from Inception even managed to be an antagonist in that story - only that the ghost doesn’t work that well as a means to resolve conflict.
On a second read, though, I realized that Liam isn’t actually resolving anything. He’s not helping Violet to grow. He is very much a figment of Violet’s imagination, yet he also makes sense within the context of this situation. Violet is isolated and suffering. She needs someone to lean on, so she makes a friend up, and she wants this friend to validate her. It is only natural that this hallucination of Liam would result.
This carries into their conversations. At one point, Liam validates Violet’s approach with Sloane. Violet doesn’t realize that she is a massive hypocrite for forcing help onto Sloane and interfering in Slone’s tests. It therefore makes sense that her hallucination of Sloane’s brother would cheer on her approach, rather than calling her out.
The long and short of it is, the hallucination of Liam is a natural extension of Violet’s characterization, not a solution to the plot. His inclusion is tolerable, at the very least.
On that note, we are done with the positives. Now it’s time to watch this book rip itself apart.
Kill the Spares
“Bring in her squad,” Nora suggests from the antechamber. “She’ll break as soon as you start on them.”
Liam’s jaw flexes, and fear knots my empty stomach.
“She didn’t during the assessment,” Varrish responses. Gods, I wish I didn’t know his voice. “And bringing them in means they’ll know what’s happened, and given the relic winding around Imogen Cardulo’s arm, I doubt she’ll be willing to wipe their memories. Killing them presents an entirely different set of issues, too. You’re sure none of the cadets have hand injuries?”
“I inspected them all myself,” Nora replies. “Devera and Emetterio are asking where she is, as is the rest of her squad. She’s missed class today.”
Here we have Yarros’s method of trying to fill in plot holes by merely calling attention to them.
We now have explicit confirmation that Draconis knows Imogen’s Signet. This means that he has enough evidence to at least bring her in for questioning.
Why does Draconis not tell the teachers what happened? Violet was found with classified documents, and she has confessed to handling those documents in a manner that amounts to a confession of stealing them. This is cut and dry. Tell them that the only reason she has not been executed is to expose her co-conspirators.
Why not bring Violet’s squad in for questioning as a precautionary measure? Violet’s only alibi for the theft applies equally to Rhiannon, so if Violet is guilty, Rhiannon should also be a suspect. Sawyer’s alibi makes him suspiciously conspicuous AFTER the Archives closed, so he’s should at least be questioned, too.
What issues would be presented by killing Violet’s squad mates? Cadets get killed all the time in RSC exercises, and those exercises could happen at any time, without warning. Here, there is an actual threat to Navarre’s security. Just grab them and do what needs to be done. (Oh, yes, and there was that time a rider was executed for making an official request for a document he couldn’t know was classified. None of the teaching staff made a fuss about that.)
In trying to explain why Draconis does not do the most reasonable of things for this world she herself has established, Yarros choses to call attention to all the things that make no sense.
Unbreakable
But it’s only my body they’ve broken. I haven’t spoken a single word.
This is nonsense, and it is nonsense solely because Yarros chose to make it so.
I do not believe for an instant that Violet could endure days of torture. Remember how viscerally she reacted to a few blows to the head? For all her bragging about enduring pain, she can’t actually stomach it, and that was just a training exercise. With what Yarros has chosen to establish, it is not credible that she could endure days of torture that is actually intended to break her.
But it’s okay, right? She survived the RSC exercise. She held up under torture, even to the bitter -
No, wait. She escaped. She never finished the exercise. She never experienced the level of torture that most of her classmates did.
By having Violet and her accessories escape that second RSC exercise, Yarros deliberately removed the only factor that could have potentially justified this. Violet needed to actually pass the exercise for it to be believable that she could endure torture.
Plot Armor
My heart jumps, pounding like it sees the chance to flee this hellscape of a body. I don’t know how tot ell it that Mira’s armor will keep it safe long after it wishes it could just stop.
They didn’t remove her body armor.
The body armor that should be public knowledge at this point.
The body armor that would be discovered while removing her weapons, given that her sheathes are sewn into it.
The body armor that visibly shimmers, as Fourth Wing helpfully told us.
Ms. Yarros, why do you insult your audience like this? Why do you demand that we take these antagonists seriously when they can’t be bothered to take body armor off someone they are actively torturing?
They Know Nothing
This is where the self-destruction gets particularly intense.
“But how much do you know?” Varrish asks softly, like it’s a kindness. “And what have you been doing with the marked ones? We’ve been watching them for years, of course, but until Cadet Aetos gave you up, all we’d had to go on was speculation.”
Just like that, the climax of Fourth Wing has become utter nonsense.
We now have explicit confirmation that the rider leadership did not know about the weapon smuggling. The only information they had to go on was a report of Xaden going AWOL. They don’t even have him on Addendum 5.3 of the Codex. Remember, this is what Dain saw:
“But it was a flash of a memory. Riorson told you he’d gone to Athebyne with his cousin.”
Not “cousins.” Cousin. Only two rebel children assembled. Literally all Xaden had done, as far as the leadership was aware, was leave the campus without permission.
For THIS, they planted a venin lure, set up a trap, and then didn’t post observers to report on Xaden’s decision or the outcome of that trap.
Ms. Yarros, that’s twice you’ve spat on our intelligence in the span of two pages. We’re really supposed to take these people seriously?
Chapter 36 is going to contradict this line. At least, I HOPE it’s a contradiction. If it’s not, than Yarros is not just spitting on the audience. She is outright urinating on us.
Confirmation that Shields Can be Detected
At this point, Draconis reveals that he has a form of mind-reading Signet. He sees people’s weaknesses. He also admits that he can’t see Violet’s weaknesses, or at least, he couldn’t prior to force-feeding her elixir so that the interrogation could take place.
“But I saw … nothing. Someone taught you to shield, and I’ll admit you’re very good at it.”
This means that the rider leadership can tell when someone is hiding something from them. Draconis’s phrasing also implies that training to shield one’s mind is not a standard practice for the riders. Shielding is therefore not a protection. It actively makes Violet, Xaden, and anyone else who knows the technique look like they have something to hide.
Rule Follower
“I’ve waited all year for you to break a rule so I could question you under the Codex. Your mom’s a real rule follower that way.”
Then why were Xaden and the rebel children with him not executed for violating Addendum 5.3, all the way back in Chapter 4? Why was Violet not questioned at that time for being complicit in their crimes?
The Threat
Violet fires back at Draconis's taunting with this zinger.
“Does Solas enjoy hiding?” My voice croaks, and I cough.
She then proceeds to remind Draconis that Tairn is stronger than Solas and that he is no doubt hunting Solas as retribution for Violet's incarceration, so Draconis is doomed.
I should like this. In a better-written story, it would be a moment of righteous defiance from a protagonist who has been pushed to the edge. She is close to breaking, but she stands defiant and mocks her torturer.
However, because Violet is a Mary Sue, because she has already been established as unbreakable, and because Tairn has already forced Draconis to grovel and beg once previously, this merely serves as a reminder of how utterly pathetic the antagonists are.
Jack Barlowe
“We could bring in Jack Barlowe if this doesn’t work.” Nora’s voice rises, bringing me fully awake from where I’ve dozed off in the chair. “Gods know he’s been waiting for retribution.”
“Tempting,” Varrish replies. “I’m sure he’d be happy to find new and inventive ways to motivate her, but we can’t trust him not to kill her. Can’t trust that kid for anything, really, can we? Too unpredictable.”
On a first read, this was baffling. Why is Yarros insisting on reminding us that her Jack resurrection twist was utterly pointless? Why is she pretending that he is still a threat? For that matter, since when was Jack involved in the interrogation side of things? He’s not Dain. He hasn’t been established to have a Signet that can aid in these endeavors. Why would Draconis, or anyone working for him, ever trust him to be effective torturer who’s willing to assist them in this endeavor? Do they make a habit of recruiting people based on nothing except a personal grudge with the current interrogation subject?
On a second read … why would any sane rider ever allow Jack the chance to learn potentially classified information by acting as an interrogator?
Dain's Intervention
Violet’s reaction to Dain helping her is this:
What the fuck is happening?
You took the words right out of my mouth, Ms. Yarros. What the fuck is happening? What have you done to your story?
Patriot Act
This is how Draconis pregames Dain for the interrogation:
“We had a breach of security this week, and classified documents were stolen. We caught the perpetrator and prevented the loss of intelligence, but the prisoner…” There’s a dramatic pause. “It’s blatantly obvious by connection that this rider is working with what we suspect to be a second rebellion, intent on destroying Navarre. For the safety of every civilian within our wards, I need this prisoner’s memories, wingleader. You must extract the truth, or our very way of life will be compromised.”
I hate to be that guy who keeps pointing out the obvious, yet I must ask again: you all remember how this military executes riders for using official channels to request documents they have no way of knowing are classified?
Surely, with what Draconis has presented here, within a regime that is as paranoid as Yarros has established, he has everything he needs to justify Violet’s arrest and torture to the teachers of the Quadrant, to arrest and interrogate anyone associated with her, and to get Melgren on board so that General Sorrengail can't shut him down. The series would end, here and now, if he did those things. Why does he not do them?
Need to Know
Draconis does not tell Dain that Violet is the subject of the interrogation before entering the room.
“I’m going to warn you,” Varrish says gently. “The prisoner’s identity may come as a shock.” The door swings open before I can fully prepare myself.
Dain has already refused to read Violet’s memories on the ground that she was injured. How did Draconis think that revealing her in a post-torture state was going to go?
On that note, it is blantantly obvious, from how Dain turns on a dime when he sees Violet’s memories of the climax of Fourth Wing, that he is in the dark about the venin prior to seeing those memories. Why would Draconis think that bringing him in was a good idea? Did he think that Dain was just not going to notice anything while poking through Violet’s head? Did he blindly assume Dain would be on board with keeping the venin secret?
More Mad Toggling
Yarros can’t decide whether Violet is nearly broken from her torture or proud and defiant.
“She wants to bring down the wards.”
“That’s not true!” I mean to shout but it comes out more as a whimper, my voice hoarse from days of screaming. Varrish has twisted everything. “I would never hurt civilians. Dain, you know—”
“I don’t know shit about you anymore,” Dain counters, his face twisting in anger.
“There’s a war out there,” I tell him, desperate to break through before he breaks me. “Poromish civilians are dying, and we’re not doing anything to help. We’re just watching it happen, Dain.”
“You think we should involve ourselves in their civil war?” Dain argues.
My shoulders slump. “I think you’ve been lied to for so long that you won’t recognize the truth even when it hits you in the face.”
I didn't skip anything. Violet goes from barely being able to speak to being in debate mode (complete with ad hominem attacks) in the span of half a page. She’s going to oscillate a few times between these states both later in this chapter and in Chapter 36.
The Rebel Children
We get this weird line as Draconis tries to coax Dain to read Violet’s memories.
“We might already be too late,” Varrish says, shaking his head. “Riorson deserted days ago, according to the reports we received this morning. We’re gathering the marked ones now.”
Why did it take DAYS for this report to get to Basgiath? The flight is less than a day. If Draconis has people at Samara who are helping to keep Xaden and Violet separate when Violet visits, then how was he not immediately notified when Xaden deserted?
Also, what does he mean “gathering”? Why are the rebel children not already being executed? Those were the stakes established back in Chapter 2. The only reason they weren't all culled back then was because the leadership didn’t know anything for certain (apparently), but this time, Xaden is confirmed to have gone AWOL. The slaughter should already have started.
Battle of (Nit)wits
Despite having no understanding of psychic powers outside of shielding herself, Violet draws this conclusion through Liam.
“He can search your memory,” Liam tells me. “But logic says he’ll have to muddle through what you’re thinking first.”
No. That is not at all logical. Dain reads MEMORIES. Recent memories, to be precise. Violet knows this. Logic says that her best hope is that he can't stomach the memories of her being tortured.
When Dain does read her mind, Violet mentally pins him in place and drowns him out by “remembering” the climax of Fourth Wing. How does she know how to do this? When did she train for it?
The fact that Violet is right, and that this works, is yet another contrivance.
The Confession (?)
Dain’s eyes flare, and he lifts his hands.
“You killed Liam,” I blurt.
He pauses. “So you keep saying. But I only searched your memory to prove my father wrong, Violet, and all you did was prove him right. If the marked ones died betraying our kingdom, then they deserved what they got.”
So … Dain DIDN’T read her memory by accident? Why did he say earlier that he did? Why does he confirm later that he did?
Also, what does he mean by “prove my father wrong”? When was it established that Colonel Aetos has suspicions of Violet prior to Dain reading her memory accidentally?
Did Dain read her mind additional times after the accidental reading?
There was an opportunity here to redeem Violet for her senseless, overwhelming spite. THIS was what should have been presented back in Chapter 21, either additional to or in the place of the accidental reading. If Dain had argued this back then, revealing that he had indeed intentionally violated Violet’s privacy, she would at least have grounds to feel betrayed, even if her blaming him for Xaden's actions is still ridiculous.
Instead, Yarros chose to make Violet an irrational bitch.
Also … I’m not entirely certain that Dain isn’t lying here for Draconis’s sake. Given how quickly he adapts to the revelation of the venin and hams things up so Draconis will give him a knife, this line almost reads as if Dain had already resolved to help Violet and was just saying what he had to so that Draconis would believe any lies he told after reading her memories. I don’t think Yarros was going for this. It’s just an uncertainty that further highlights the misplacement of this line.
Hamming
After Dain reads Violet’s memories, Yarros has him get very hammy as he loudly proclaims that Violet is a traitor. At the same time, she has Violet realize that it's all over. She has failed Xaden. All is lost. All is -
Oh, right. Violet is a Mary Sue. She can’t actually fail.
And Dain’s ranting about Violet’s crimes goes on awfully long …
Yeah, the fact that Dain would side with Violet and betray Draconis was very blatantly telegraphed. There was no shock or weight to it. In hindsight, I wonder if Yarros has that line where Violet asks, “What the fuck is happening?” because she realized that she needed to prompt the audience to be surprised.
CHARACTER
Violet
Violet remains consistent in these chapters. Her Sue-ness undermines the stakes. Her blind hatred of Dain is so played-out that it’s tiresome when she lashes out at him.
All I need to highlight here is that, in this chapter, Yarros tries to convince us that Violet is not a perfect Sue. Thrice, she tries to imply that Violet made mistakes or has weaknesses. Each time, she is unwilling to actually mar Violet’s image, so her efforts only serve to amplify Violet’s Sue status.
The Archives Contrivance
As mentioned above, Yarros explicitly calls out Violet failing to consider the alarms to be a mistake. We’ve already covered why this fails from a Plot perspective. Character-wise, the fact that everything Violet planned for went off without a hitch, yet this one thing that slipped through the cracks, actually implies perfection. Nothing that our Mary Sue accounted for could beat her. She had to be defeated by something that, logically, she simply could not have known about.
Breaking Dain
Yarros toys with the idea of Violet failing when Dain reads her mind, only to pull an immediate reversal. Violet did not actually fail. She saved herself.
Too Pure for This Sinful Earth
This is Violet’s weakness, as described by Draconis.
“Well, Cadet Sorrengail, your weaknesses are the people you love. So many people to choose from. Squad Leader Matthias and the rest of your squad, your sister, your dragons.” A twisted smile curves his mouth. “Lieutenant Riorson.”
No mention of her hypocrisy, her blind spite, her being a slave to her emotions, or any of the other flaws that leak through the Protagonist-Centered Morality. She is just so good and loving, you see. What are pure and perfect soul.
Nolon
This is the point where Nolon is forcefully pivoted from Good Teacher to Bad Teacher. The fact that all he did was betray Violet and do his job when it would inconvenience her really shows how paper-thin the Good Teacher / Bad Teacher dichotomy is. Yes, being involved in days of torture will obviously make it hard for Violet to ever trust him again, but at the end of the day, Violet committed treason, and Nolon was just doing his job to undo the damage that she did. If anything, she betrayed him.
WORLDBUILDING
I have just three small points to cover in this section.
Heart of a Liar
The epigraph for Chapter 35 is utterly bizarre. The all-caps word was italicized for emphasis in the original text.
The only signet more terrifying than an inntinnsic is a truth-sayer. And yet we let THEM live.
—Major Afendra’s Guide to the Riders Quadrant (Unauthorized Edition)
What manner of twisted logic is this, Major?
Inntinnsics are way more terrifying that truth-sayers. Truth-sayers need to sift information out manually, questioning people and then chipping away at the lies. Inntinnsics just rip the information out of people’s heads. Based on how Draconis compared his own Signet to an inntinnsic’s, it’s implied that maybe inntinnsics can be defeated by mental shielding, while truth-sayers cannot, but given how shielding requires active mental effort anyway, that’s not a huge advantage.
Is this major a pathological liar who is just that terrified of being called out?
Truth-Sayers
Why do truth-sayers need Violet to answer questions to know when she is telling the truth?
With how the truth-sayer Signet was established during the second RSC exercise, they read physical tells in a person’s biology, identifying lies from the stress that non-psycopathic individuals feel when trying to conceal truth. Technically, a person does not need to lie to experience the rise in stress level. Merely contemplating a lie would cause at least a slight spike. This would be especially true if the Signet read brain waves instead of stress levels (something that even psychopaths seem unable to bypass), though I do not think that this Signet actually goes that far.
Why not just ask Violet questions and check her stress levels to determine when they are close to the mark?
Yarros even establishes that this would work. Right after Draconis calls out Violet for being too pure for this sinful Earth, we get this reaction from Violet and a call-out from the truth-sayer.
My heartbeat skips.
“Hold steady, Violet,” Liam says.
“She’s triggered,” Nora notes from the doorway.
They can read her stress levels without her even needing to speak a lie. Why not just ask direct questions and interpret the answers from Violet's stress levels, then? Why engage with and accept her poor attempts at subjective truth?
Elixir Limitations
This is not strictly a flaw, yet it is nagging question I had throughout this part.
If Violet is drugged with the elixir, what happens if she dies? What happens if Tairn dies?
Violet seems convinced that Tairn can still sense her, that it’s only that she can't sense him. If she’s right (and, given that this is an irrational conclusion with nothing to support it, she must be right), that implies that Tairn would suffer the consequences of Violet’s death even if she is on the elixir at the time. That’s fine. What about the reverse, though? If Tairn dies, will Violet sense it? Liam’s death in Fourth Wing was implied to be due to cardiac arrest, either due to the stress of feeling his dragon die or some magical feedback. If Violet can't sense Tairn and loses all magic she would otherwise gain from him, how can she suffer either of those effects?
This bleeds over to Draconis. Could he drink the elixir to save himself if Tairn is about to kill Solas?
CONSEQUENCES AND REVELATIONS
Chapter 36 brings Part One to a close with an avalanche of poorly executed payoffs. Whereas Chapter 35 actively sabotages the plot up to this point, Chapter 36 takes a crowbar to the characters, then bashes the worldbuilding over the head for good measure. It also delivers an overly saccharine payoff to the Romance subplot that falls apart if one thinks about it for ever a few seconds. There are ideas here that could have worked in a better-written story, but as it stands, we are stumbling along through slop.
It’s coming your way next Friday. I hope that you’re ready for it. Have a good week.
