Violet continues to have trouble with the obstacle course right up until the do-or-die day. Is it a literal do-or-die? Hell if I know because this book isn’t clear. People don’t even act like there’s any pressure, it’s more like 100% of these people are so dedicating to being a dragon rider that they’re willing to engage in extremely risky training for the chance. Not one single person has said ‘I want out’ and Violet’s out is secret so we have zero clue as to what would happen in that scenario, which is just boggling to me.

In my Army basic training, there wasn’t an easy way out because we had signed a contract, but there were still ways. My class had someone who realized they were not a good fit and they just purposely failed at everything. Just stopped working, basically. They took a lot of shit, but they got out and they didn’t die from it.

The idea that this school has 100% of its recruits chill with being there – and this school specifically – beggars belief.

But more importantly, if I go, if I hide…I’ll never know if I’m good enough to make it here. And while I might not survive if I stay, I’m not sure I can live with myself if I leave.

This attitude is the most we’ll ever get as an explanation for why she’s still here. Coming from a disabled person, it’s…icky, to me. It ties ‘good enough’ to basically being able bodied, to being the same as everyone else, and…icky.

But, because this book is what it is, Violet goes to her final obstacle course run with presumably no injuries from her previous attempts and also a plan. Dain makes one last attempt to get her to save herself. Apparently he’s the only person in this book who doesn’t realize that she has plot armor.

Violet gets through the course until the chimney climb and then grabs one of the ropes that are around to help her. (There’s random ropes that they can grab to avoid falling but there’s a time penalty for it.) She uses the rope to turn the chimney climb into a rope wall climb. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wL_Z059q7yU Then it’s on to the warped wall, and she gets up that by stabbing the wall with one of her daggers to make a handhold for herself to get up the extra height.

Another section leader named Amber calls her a cheater, but Violet pulls out some rules lawyering and comes up with a technical loophole that lets her get away with using the dagger. It all stands, but Amber is super mad about it.

Directly after the obstacle course is done (and two more people die) they get to go meet the dragons. It’s not bonding time yet, everyone’s just gonna go look at each other. They walk in a straight line down the field, then straight back, while the dragons ogle. There’s a feathertail dragon in the mix, and leadership speculates that it’s just there out of curiosity.

The walk starts, and Violet chats with Rhiannan the whole way both to keep themselves calm and to show off to the dragons “no, see, I can get along with others, I’m good.”

They spot the feathertail, who is not just a feathertail but also tiny and gold-colored, two things no one has seen before. Ooo, wow, so very special, the specialist ever, guess where this dragon ends up.

Another guy on the squad (Tynan) can’t shut the fuck up about how freakish the short dragon is and how it looks like it’ll be weak and useless and it’s wild the other dragons didn’t just kill it.

On the way back, one squadmate waffles and hesitates a lot and gets burned to death by a dragon. Another one acts annoying and also gets killed. If this was the only murder going on in this absolute nonsense of a school, I would be totally cool with it. (As a reader.) Dragons don’t have to make sense to us, and human attitudes towards death by natural disaster are waaaay different than death by other humans so the psychology would be totally different. I have no idea why the book had these three-story-tall impatient monsters in it and yet still felt it necessary to include Death Bridges and Murder Sparring.

Several days later, and it’s now time for the day the dragons pick their riders, which is called Threshing for reasons I don’t know. I guess because dragons kill a lot of the folks they don’t pick. There’s a lot of last minute reminders about how there’s some mystical woo in the process and listen to your gut and all that, then the students are released to go wander around a valley looking for dragons.

Considering dragons are all intelligent in this world and they’ve already seen each other, I’m not sure what the point to this wander around bit is. This could easily be as simple as picking teams for dodgeball, just line up and let the dragons point at you. But then we wouldn’t get Violet’s latest badassery so let’s go on.

I’ve now come across every color of dragon, and none of them has spoken to me or given me the sense of connection we’re reportedly supposed to feel.

She climbs a tree to get a read on what’s going on with the rest of the valley and notices she’s not the only cadet left, then notices the golden dragon flying around nearby. And then, conveniently, a group of boys pass under her tree having a plot relevant conversation. Girl needs to climb trees more often; apparently every single time someone passes underneath it and starts talking.

The group is Jack, Oren (first kid she poisoned) and Tynan (annoying kid from last chapter). They’re talking about going off to kill the gold dragon because it’s ‘weak’ and ‘a danger to the wing.’

This has to be done. That scrawny one is going to get someone killed. We have to take it out.”

But Jack…you kill people.

Whatever, it’s not like Jack has ever made sense.

Violet decides to go to the gold dragon and warn it, since she saw it from the tree and has a better idea of where it is. She starts to run and trips over a branch, spraining her ankle in the process.

Block the pain. Block it. But there’s no mental trick to keep the shooting agony from turning my stomach as I drag myself to my knees and rise carefully, keeping my weight on my left ankle.

She then proceeds to move around for the rest of the chapter. Limping, we assume, but moving.

I’ve had some really bad sprains in my life and thing is…the joint just stops working. Just refuses to operate correctly or take weight. But every time Violet gets ‘injured,’ she just hurts. That’s it, that’s the only consequence, it hurts but functions. I was under the impression that EDS involved more than just the sensation of pain…

Violet gets to the gold dragon, but telling it to leave doesn’t achieve anything. Then the three boys arrive, dun dun dun. Violet gets out her knives and prepares to defend herself/the dragon. On a sprained ankle. Or, given how much she’s walking on it, I have to assume a strained ankle.

We shall have to cover that fight next time, however, because Xaden arrives just in time to bear witness and then the chapter ends. Jee, what a cliffhanger, I wonder what might happen. There’s just so much danger here, isn’t there? Certainly we can’t even begin to guess that Violet will do just fine because no amount of ‘injury’ ever actually slows her down in the slightest.