Fourth Wing Live Reactions: Chapter 9

[penwalla]

• ch. 9
• so violet has to fight xylon. dain butts in to protest--has it occurred to him it does violet no favors to be thought of as weak--but obviously fails, bc this is military dragon riding school and combat is mandatory.
• AGAIN. dain knows about violet's medical issues, he should be able to just get her transferred on that basis alone.
• violet is armed and he is not. she's losing. xylon refrains from harming her and starts picking off her weapons as she tries to stab him. he gives her a cute nickname, "violence". that is both stupid and weird.
• in general the trope of giving someone who dislikes you a nickname as like, a romantic gesture, is so weird. it's like when kaiba/jounouchi shippers pretend "puppy" was an endearment instead of kaiba being the fucking worst because jounouchi committed the offense of *checks notes* being poor and worse at card games.
• xylon is using this fight to instruct violet, which is actually not bad of him, considering she sucks at combat and has been poisoning her way through the fights. he's figured out her strat btw. no credit for this, it's pretty obvious.
• violet and xylon have a good set up for a legitimate enemies to lovers romance--her mom killed his father and she is a symbol of the country oppressing him, whereas his father killed her brother. unfortunately the author doesn't seem to realize this. so far xylon is just like, a generically dickish alpha male love interest, and violet comes off as weirdly hateful in contrast to his banter. she has a good reason to hate him, but the author doesn't make use of it. again, it comes down to the premise of this book being poorly constructed. if violet deliberately joined the riders to avenge her brother, and xylon is using his conscription to plot his revenge, now they have a strong reason to hate each other and also a reason to become entangled and fall in love.
• violet is pinned to the ground by xylon so naturally she's just thinking about how hot he is and how mad she is about it. xylon is giving her genuinely useful combat advice but in a douchey way. i'm not against this trope of being attracted to someone you hate, but again it feels like yarros has forgotten her own backstory. violet has a great reason to hate xylon--he killed her brother--but she wouldn't be attracted to him, even unwillingly, if yarros actually mentioned that. so instead she just hates him for existing and being a dick, even though he's helping her. despite violet's protests that xylon will kill her, he literally has never tried and instead has been useful to her more than once. girl, get a clue.
• next scene. dain is giving violet a scantily clad massage. they have a fight because dain is still trying to sneak violet into the scribe's quadrant behind her back, and she's mad because she feels like he doesn't have any faith in her abilities. so uh...i have a question.
• why is violet so mad about this? one, she thinks about how weak she is constantly. two, she wanted to be a scribe and was forcibly sent to the riders. what's her reason for changing her mind? we still haven't got that moment where she gives us her new clarity of purpose. if she's decided she wants to be a rider for herself, we need to see that.
• and violet, you suck at combat and you're in the military. that's why dain rightfully thinks you'll die.
• violet says she'll think about it.