Total pages in book: 247
Estimated words: 235897 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1179(@200wpm)___ 944(@250wpm)___ 786(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 235897 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1179(@200wpm)___ 944(@250wpm)___ 786(@300wpm)
“Only in Fourth Wing!” Iris Drue announces, the leader of First Wing moving to Faber’s side. “First Wing stands strong! Stands loyal to Navarre!”
A cheer rises from the left.
“Not sure I’d brag about being in the wing that produced Jack Barlowe!” Ridoc counters.
“Ridoc!” Rhi hisses.
“I’m done,” he promises as Dain shoots a glare his way.
“Really missing the professors right now,” Aaric says under his breath.
“Challenge Aetos!” someone yells from the left, and a new fear wraps its fingers around my heart and squeezes. There’s no single person in the courtyard with the authority to command us all. The only thing more dangerous than a quadrant full of arrogant killing machines is a leaderless quadrant, and if Dain accepts the challenge and…falls, an alliance with Poromiel won’t matter—we’ll tear each other apart from within.
Now would be a great time for Xaden to lower his fucking shields.
“The Dark One cannot unite what he broke.”
“Stop calling him that.”
“You blame us for Barlowe, but you’re the ones who left!” Aura motions at our side of the formation, displaying her bevy of patches beneath the one that indicates her fire-wielding signet as she stalks toward Dain.
Dain draws his dagger and drops it in the snow, facing Aura unarmed. “I’m not raising my blade against you, Beinhaven.”
“That’s a…choice,” Aaric says quietly. “He’s going to talk her down?”
One by one, I flex my fingers along the hilt of my dagger, prepping my hand for movement as power hums within me.
“Yes, we left,” Dain continues, his hands closing into fists. “But we also returned.”
Aura reaches for her shoulder as if forgetting she already used and lost that dagger, but she doesn’t draw the sword at her hip. “Did it occur to any of you that they only attacked because they knew we weren’t at full strength? That your desertion allowed the wards to fall in the first place?”
Ouch.
“We chose truth,” Dain shouts back, a vein bulging in his neck. “We chose to defend the helpless—”
“You chose to break the riot! Fracture the quadrant!” Aura counters, pointing her gloved finger at Dain’s chest as she approaches him with slow, methodical steps that elevate my pulse. “And then you bring home the very enemy we’ve spent centuries fighting, the enemy that killed my own cousin in one of their raids! And you think we should welcome them into the heart of the kingdom they’ve been trained to destroy?”
The Navarrians mutter in agreement.
“I think our boy is losing this one,” Aaric whispers. “He’s good, but he’s no Riorson.”
Xaden hadn’t just led Fourth Wing, he’d commanded the respect—and fear—of the entire quadrant. My jaw clenches. But he isn’t a cadet anymore, and the entirety of the Riders Quadrant will only answer to one of its own. He can’t unite what he broke.
“Xaden can’t fix this,” I murmur, mostly to myself. Fuck it, I hate when Tairn’s right.
Mercifully, he keeps silent.
“We need the fliers!” Dain holds his ground.
“You need them!” Aura’s voice edges on bitterness as she takes another step toward Dain. “We fought to save Basgiath! We were steadfast in our defense! We never wavered!” Another chorus of cheers resounds as she turns to the quadrant like a politician.
“He can’t win the crowd. She’s going to really challenge him,” Aaric warns, his gaze darting over the audience of dragons and gryphons, and I suddenly remember exactly who he is.
“Any chance you have an affinity for public speaking?” I ask Aaric, undoing the first button on my flight jacket as the heat builds. “It certainly runs in your family.”
“Was it the shunning of my birthright in favor of a high probability of death that gave me away?” he responds, his tone dry.
I take that as a no.
“What do you say? Their strongest against our strongest?” Aura taps her bloody hand over her heart. “I’ll make you a deal, wingleader. Defeat me, and your fliers live to see the morning. Fail to rise to the occasion, and we’ll stain this courtyard red.”
The Navarrians’ roar of approval rattles my teeth.
“Dain isn’t the strongest,” Andarna points out.
“Dain can take her in hand-to-hand.” Nepotism isn’t the only reason he earned his rank, and wielding isn’t allowed in challenges. I watch every motion as Aura tugs at the fingers of her glove instead of reaching for another dagger or her sword. My stomach tenses. There’s only one reason she’d need her hands bare.
Fire trumps memory-wielding every time.
Aura gestures to the hard-packed snow between them. “Let this serve as our mat. What would our combat master say?” she asks the crowd.
“Begin!” the whole of First Wing calls out.
“I’m not fighting you, Aura!” Dain roars.
“I’m fighting you!” Aura fidgets with her glove, and I flip my dagger, holding it by the tip. “Or have you really turned coward? Just another rebel who needs to be marked as such?”
Marked. Rage narrows my eyes.