In the uneasy weeks after Basgiath’s defense, Violet Sorrengail hides Xaden Riorson’s worsening condition after he once drew from the earth; faint red rings in his eyes and a new ability to sense venin convince him he is changing. Venin disguised as scribes infiltrated the wards, tried to free the imprisoned Jack Barlowe, and forced Violet’s squad and Xaden to fight underground. Politics followed battle: Violet bargained with the Senarium to launch a mission for Andarna’s kind, only to be bound by a Code conflict when Xaden was appointed a temporary instructor. Pressed by failing talks with Poromiel, Violet led a treasonous midnight operation to remove a single protective rune from the wardstone so Poromish fliers could wield safely; she escaped punishment via a blanket pardon, but General Aetos retaliated by sending her squad to Samara.

At Samara, a plea drew Violet to aid Newhall, where a trap set by the silver-haired Theophanie revealed she could call lightning and knew Violet’s bonds; Garrick arrived with Chradh to pull Violet from a crash as Theophanie offered “lessons” and probed how Violet had bonded two dragons. Back at Basgiath, Violet pushed for a cure and interrogated Jack; he confirmed venin sense each other, initiates need little training if already versed in magic, and no venin seeks a cure. With negotiations still fragile, Violet secured a task force and wrested the roster, then took a perilous route through Deverelli. After a brutal court where King Courtlyn executed a guard and ordered their deaths, Violet bartered with Andarna’s irid eggshell and a daring display by Andarna to win hunting rights and passage—only for Xaden’s overwhelming shadows later to betray how close he skated to becoming what he feared.

The search veered through Unnbriel, where challenges by dagger won an audience but no troops—only shelter in exchange for an impossible price in dragon eggs. At Hedotis, a “wisdom” dinner turned lethal when the triumvirate staged a poison test; Violet counterpoisoned them with arinmint leverage, identified the zakia-berry toxin, and saved Garrick while wrenching a grudging, covert détente. They then won a decisive alliance at Zehyllna, but paid with Trager’s life in a ritual of luck. The funeral pyre on a remote volcanic isle unexpectedly brought six irid dragons; Andarna told her story, and the irids judged Violet and the Empyrean wanting, declaring Andarna “irid in scale and name only,” barring aid, and stating there was no cure for venin. The rejection fractured the team and exposed Xaden’s red-flecked eyes to Ridoc, forcing Violet to set a hard line if Xaden ever turned on riders or civilians.

War overtook politics. After Suniva fell—likely under Theophanie’s storm-borne infiltration that seized a shipment of alloy daggers—Basgiath turned to real war training. Xaden opened Tyrrendor’s borders to refugees as new shadows manifested in a first-year, “the balance,” and resigned his professorship to manage Tyrrendor. In Aretia, Violet rediscovered hope and control with Xaden as he pushed toward a personal stability mark without draining. During a storm, they realized Violet’s second signet, inherited via Andarna, was dream-walking, after she repeatedly entered Xaden’s nightmares of the Sage at Draithus and had also stepped into Maren’s grief. An alarm cut discovery short: wyvern descended on Aretia. Violet held the walls forward of the city and then rushed groundside to Dunne’s temple when Theophanie threatened mass slaughter; as wyvern began to fall from the sky, Leothan appeared and revealed the irids had fired the wardstone. In the aftermath he severed or suppressed Violet’s bond to Andarna and took her away, plunging Violet into days of grief until Mira arrived and a family argument revealed her parents had attempted to dedicate Violet at Unnbriel years before.

News arrived: Theophanie held Mira at Draithus and demanded Violet and “your brother.” Brennan forced a single objective—kill Theophanie—warning Violet and Xaden not to split their focus. On the field outside Draithus, Theophanie slit Mira’s throat and fled; Brennan mended Mira with power funneled through Sloane and Dain. Violet sent Tairn to airlift the chained Teine, then faced Theophanie, who proved to be a storm wielder; maorsite blasts staggered her but not for long. With wyvern swarming the city and a horde bending toward the Medaro Pass, Violet refused to overextend, trusting Rhiannon’s shield at the pass and committing to her objective. Sgaeyl pulled Violet from a desiccation trap; reunited with Tairn, Violet unleashed repeated sky-wide lightning to thin the horde and then dove for venin riders as Theophanie dropped a tornado toward Draithus.

Near the mountains, Theophanie killed the storm and netted Tairn and Sgaeyl; Violet shattered the net, then darkness swept the world as Xaden, cornered with Sgaeyl netted and Berwyn threatening her, exhaled an onyx storm across the theater, shredding wyvern nets and purging the skies. In that engineered night, Violet remembered Aaric’s instruction to “strike in the dark,” saw Andarna emerge small and snarling, and drove the marble dagger—temple stone of Dunne—into Theophanie’s heart. The Maven desiccated instantly, condemned as a high priestess who turned from her goddess. Violet collapsed as Draithus’s wards stabilized and the city fought on: Imogen and Dain killed venin on the walls, but Quinn died in Imogen’s arms; Garrick ferried allies, and Zehyllna’s soldiers arrived under Molvic to reinforce the ground.

Dawn brought fractured triumph and new loss. Violet awoke in Aretia with gaps in memory, Andarna’s voice protective, and Tairn sleeping off damage. Reports named murdered riders and dragons in the valley and missing eggs; a sealed parchment from Dunne’s temple confirmed Violet’s legal marriage to Xaden, with his note—“Don’t look for me. It’s yours now.”—and Imogen admitting she had done what Violet had asked, implying deliberate memory shielding. Xaden had vanished after the onyx storm, the irids’ help had come at the cost of Andarna leaving, alliances were secured or strained, and Violet was left to lead, navigate the fallout, and hold to her vow: protect her people, the wards, and the man she loved, even as his path edged closer to the darkness he feared.