Onyx Storm: Chapter 8

[penwalla]

While many preach loyalty to Hedeon above all others, especially in Calldyr Province, I find that favoring Zihnal has universal appeal. Everyone wants wisdom but needs luck.

—Major Rorilee’s Guide to Appeasing the Gods,
Second Edition

Religion has been such a nonentity in this book. It's a shame. It's just another way in which it feels like Yarros herself is not really interested in fantasy. The world of Navarre feels so thin--it feels like there's so little about it that is distinct and that anchors it as its own culture. This book never takes the opportunity to do any worldbuilding beyond what's needed to move the plot along. There's no flavor.

We open with General Aetos, who has been promoted, marching Violet out of the Battle Brief to arrest her for treason. This involves us leaving Battle Brief, so I'm all for it.

Aetos takes Violet to the Senarium for a trial. She tells Xaden, who is now a member, via telepathy that she has a plan. This is her plan:

“I’ll save everyone the fuss of organizing a trial and execution.” I point to the patch I cut off my uniform last night. “That’s mine. I was the one who orchestrated altering the wardstone. I’m the reason that the fliers can wield and that you now have a clear path to negotiate an alliance. You’re welcome.”

Also, since she was pardoned this morning and committed the crime last night, it...doesn't count. Uh. Okay. I feel like the rules only matter in this book when they're in Violet's favor. But no time to worry about that, because the Queen of Poromiel shows up to tell Violet how great she is. And, because she's grateful the fliers are being allowed to stay, she tells Violet that she can access her personal library, which is better than the one Tecarus has.

Xaden is mad at Violet for her risking her life to get access to venin information (which is what is in Tecarus and the Queen's libraries) but she ignores him because she doesn't care. A refreshing change from all the bickering in Iron Flame.

Violet runs into Aetos again in the hallway and they have a verbal altercation.

“You lost.” My fingers brush the hilt of a dagger at my thigh as I glare up at the man I’d once considered a role model. “You tried to kill us at Athebyne, sent assassins after me in the fall, and even sicced Varrish on me, and I’m still here. You lost. We’re pardoned. We’re here.”

“And yet I’m the one the king appointed to take over as commanding general of Basgiath”—he gestures to the busy hall around us—“so maybe it’s you who has actually lost, Cadet Sorrengail.”

Aetos points out that while Violet and Xaden might not be expendable, Violet's friends all aren't, and then he assigns Violet's entire squad to Samara, where there is active fighting and which is a long twenty hour flight away, more than the gryphons can handle.

So, uh...wait a minute. What is Aetos going to do if Violet's squad just refuses? Sure, they're nominally in his chain of command, but half the cadets at Basgiath defected back in Iron Flame. If half the cadets at the college plus a good number of the riders just straight up decide not to obey Aetos, what exactly is he going to do? He admits that Violet and Xaden are too powerful for him to fuck with, but actually the entire Aretian cohort should be too powerful for him to fuck with. Yeah, Aretia doesn't have any wards, but Basgiath's already been invaded by the venin multiple times and just made an alliance with Poromiel that definitely wouldn't have been possible without the involvement of the rebels. They cannot afford to appoint someone like Aetos as leader and risk the rebels fucking off.

Does Yarros understand this? Violet and Xaden aren't just valuable because of their personal abilities. If Violet took half of Basgiath with her in Iron Flame, the rebels plus the gryphons outnumber the remaining riders at Basgiath. They have the leverage to just ignore Aetos. Him being named general doesn't give him any inherent authority when half the people he's commanding literally defected to join a rebellion against the current government.

And they just signed a treaty giving safe haven to fliers to secure the Poromish alliance, does Aetos sending the gryphons to Samara out of spite not violate that? Why is he risking the entire alliance for petty spite?

It's just Varrish and Jack Barlowe all over again. Yarros puts these cartoonishly evil villains in her book, and their existence makes no sense in what is supposed to be an epic fantasy about war and revolution. If you think about their plans for like, two seconds, you realize it makes no sense that they could get away with it, but they have to by authorial fiat so that the book has a villain for Violet to defeat.

Also, if dragons don't obey humans, why can't their dragons just say, no we're not doing that and the matter is settled? Tairn spent all of Iron Flame threatening to eat Varrish and threatening to eat Varrish's dragon and yet Varrish didn't die until he literally almost tortured Violet to death. If dragons are united on the subject of protecting their young, why wouldn't all the dragons say, no you can't see Andarna and just shut him down?

It doesn't make sense. If you think about the implications of anything in this book, it DOESN'T MAKE SENSE.

Okay, I'm calming down. And also, the chapter is over.