penwalla

ch. 19
time is frozen as violet makes her escape. unfortunately she stops to gape at xylon, aka her dark avenging angel, at which point time restarts.
do...do angels exist in this world? we know so little about the religion that it's hard to say, but characters reference hell and heaven, and now angels, so...does christianity exist? or like a fantasy equiv? yarros???
xylon kills everyone with his shadow powers and also a knife. despite being completely against killing, violet does not feel bad at all about having to see this. on one hand, she should be inured to death after the insane number of deaths that have preceded this, but violet's also been characterized as compassionate and opposed to senseless violence, so i feel like she ought to have some kind of emotional response.
two more riders--i think these are fellow rebel kids--come in. i'll be honest, the sheer number of named characters who have bit parts is huge in this book, i cannot keep track.
violet panics a little afterward and xylon has to look after her. she also has broken ribs, or at least bruised ribs--violet says they're just bruised because there was "no telltale snap", but i don't think that's a real thing. ribs aren't like long bones, you can have rib fractures that don't even show up on imaging.
xylon is doing his domineering alpha antihero thing and demands she not lie to him and show him her injuries. so now she's taking off her clothes and he's taking off her armored corset (so it is a corset?) and she's getting turned on. she notes there's still blood on the floor. at least the bodies are gone...
would EDS increase your risk of rib fractures? i don't actually know so I won't comment.
xylon laces her back up, puts on her boots for her, and whisks her off to safety. violet is still shocked by this. i don't know why. xylon has never posed a serious threat to her and she knows their dragons are mated and they're essentially stick with each other until that changes. he has every reason to want to protect her. why is it so hard for her to consider he cares?
violet's like. i would definitely fuck him. yeah he killed people but it was sexy.
god i wish yarros had the skill of like. a single svsss darkfic author. this could be good!!!
xylon takes violet through a secret tunnel to Big T. she preemptively tells him she would never sleep with him for safety, which...girl who was offering? i think this banter is supposed to be flirty but it's not very good. xylon then points out violet is, you know, in the military and her job will be killing people so she should probably get used to it.
you know, that's a good point. violet is the daughter of a famous, high-ranked military official. her siblings are both riders. she lived in the war college for the past 6 years. why does she have a strong opposition to killing? the book never explores this, and it really should. it's not like violet is anti-war and was planning a civilian life, she was just going to apply to a different, non-combat branch of the military.
xylon and Big T are arguing because xylon wants to know what happened. apparently if two dragons are mates they can communicate with each other's riders, too.
the golden feathertail turns out to be a baby dragon. is this supposed to be a plot twist?
baby dragons aren't supposed to bond because they can't channel--instead they accidentally send their powers to their riders. apparently the rider's signet abilities are a combo of dragon power and human channeling, but each dragon also has a unique power, i guess? the baby dragons' powers aren't stable, so if they bond their humans can drain them.
there's some talk about how if humans knew this, they would hunt the feathertails down to use them.
i'm not sure why? i mean yes, it would mean the humans wouldn't have to depend on the dragon channeling them, but also the feathertails are weaker and they will mature into fully grown dragons. and to be honest, it's pretty clear the humans have no actual defenses against the dragons, right? i feel like if they started hunting juveniles down for forced bonding they'd be crisped real quick.
time stopping is unheard of so violet is freaking out and wondering if she'll be killed.
ok, hold on. mind reading is a capital offense? isn't DAIN'S power mind reading?
oh so feathertail gifts disappear once the dragons can channel? so what the hell does channeling even mean? are the dragons dependent on human bonding to access their magic or something?
violet is still thinking about xylon might be planning to kill her later. she is supposed to be smart.
someone unlocked violet's door so that she could be attacked at night....WHOMST?
ch. 20
the names of the dead are being read aloud at breakfast. this is a nice bit of consistent world-building. violet then starts lusting after xylon again. maybe for a change she could notice a personality trait? just one? please?
xylon swaps one of his buffest rebel comrades into violet's squad to protect her. she hates this and complains about it publicly and loudly. wasn't she so concerned about not looking weak? does that only apply when she's refusing perfectly good medical care?
one of the military leaders announces that the codex has been breached, and asks the accuser to step forward. once again we are reminded that fraternizing with commanding officers is frowned upon, not illegal. violet says she misses sex.
xylon steps up to announce one of his riders was attacked last night. it's someone named amber mavis? no idea who this is. again, this book has too many undifferentiated named characters. dain tries to defend her by saying wingleaders are above reproach, which is stupid because he definitely thought xylon was sketch as hell and xylon outranks him. again, this fixation of dain's on rules and the chain of command feels like yarros is tacking it on now to retroactively vilify dain.
dain then tries to read violet's mind by trying to grab her face so he can prove to himself she's lying.
the wingleaders all agree amber has to be executed. by fire. violet panics and tries to walk it back, because she doesn't want amber's dragon to suffer. and she's right, amber's dragon mourns her death immediately!
so...do the dragons get attached to their humans or not? this book is not consistent on this.