Page 19 of Fourth Wing

“Dain Aetos, you and your squad will switch with Aura Beinhaven’s,” Nyra orders.

Wait. What? Who is Aura Beinhaven?

Dain nods, then turns to us. “Follow me.” He says it once, then strides through formation, leaving us to scurry after him. We pass another squad on the way from…from…

The very breath freezes in my lungs.

We’re moving to Fourth Wing. Xaden’s wing.

It takes a minute, maybe two, and we take our place in the new formation. I force myself to breathe. There’s a fucking smirk on Xaden’s arrogant, handsome face.

I’m now entirely at his mercy, a subordinate in his chain of command. He can punish me however he likes for the slightest infraction, even imaginary ones.

Nyra looks at Xaden as she finishes assignments, and he nods, stepping forward and finally breaking our staring contest. I’m pretty sure he won, considering my heart is galloping like a runaway horse.

“You’re all cadets now.” Xaden’s voice carries out over the courtyard, stronger than the others. “Take a look at your squad. These are the only people guaranteed by Codex not to kill you. But just because they can’t end your life doesn’t mean others won’t. You want a dragon? Earn one.”

Most of the others cheer, but I keep my mouth shut.

Sixty-seven people fell or died in some other way today. Sixty-seven just like Dylan, whose parents would either collect their bodies or watch them be buried at the foot of the mountain under a simple stone. I can’t force myself to cheer for their loss.

Xaden’s eyes find mine, and my stomach clenches before he looks away. “And I bet you feel pretty badass right now, don’t you, first-years?”

More cheers.

“You feel invincible after the parapet, don’t you?” Xaden shouts. “You think you’re untouchable! You’re on the way to becoming the elite! The few! The chosen!”

Another round of cheers goes up with each declaration, louder and louder.

No.That’s not just cheering, it’s the sound of wings beating the air into submission.

“Oh gods, they’re beautiful,” Rhiannon whispers at my side as they come into view—a riot of dragons.

I’ve spent my life around dragons, but always from a distance. They don’t tolerate humans they haven’t chosen. But these eight? They’re flying straight for us—at speed.

Just when I think they’re about to fly overhead, they pitch vertically, whip the air with their huge semitranslucent wings, and stop, the gusts of wing-made wind so powerful that I nearly stagger backward as they land on the outer semicircular wall. Their chest scales ripple with movement, and their razor-sharp talons dig into the edge of the wall on either side. Now I understand why the walls are ten feet thick. It’s not a barrier. The edge of the fortress is a damnedperch.

My mouth drops open. In my five years of living here, I’ve never seen this, but then again, I’ve never been allowed to watch what happens on Conscription Day.

A few cadets scream.

Guess everyone wants to be a dragon rider until they’re actually twenty feet away from one.

Steam blasts my face as the navy-blue one directly in front of me exhales through its wide nostrils. Its glistening blue horns rise above its head in an elegant, lethal sweep, and its wings flare momentarily before tucking in, the tip of their top joint crowned by a single fierce talon. Their tails are just as fatal, but I can’t see them at this angle or even tell which breed of dragon each is without that clue.

All are deadly.

“We’re going to have to bring the masons in again,” Dain mutters as chunks of rock crumble under the dragons’ grips, crashing to the courtyard in boulders the size of my torso.

There are three dragons in various shades of red, two shades of green—like Teine, Mira’s dragon—one brown like Mom’s, one orange, and the enormous navy one ahead of me. They’re all massive, overshadowing the structure of the citadel as they narrow their golden eyes at us in absolute judgment.

If they didn’t need us puny humans to develop signet abilities from bonding and weave the protective wards they power around Navarre, I’m pretty sure they’d eat us all and be done. But they like protecting the Vale—the valley behind Basgiath the dragons call home—from merciless gryphons and we like living, so here we are in the most unlikely of partnerships.

My heart threatens to beat out of my chest, and I absolutely agree with it, because I’d like to run, too. Just thinking that I’m supposed torideone of these is fucking ludicrous.

A cadet bolts out of Third Wing, screaming as he makes a run for the stone keep behind us. We all turn to look as he sprints for the giant arched door at the center. I can almost see the words carved into the arch from here, but I already know them by heart.A dragon without its rider is a tragedy.A rider without their dragon is dead.

Once bonded, riders can’t live without their dragons, but most dragons can live just fine after us. It’s why they choose carefully, so they’re not humiliated by picking a coward, not that a dragon would ever admit to making a mistake.

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