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Violet Sorrengail is the protagonist in Fourth Wing, and through the course of the novel she transforms from a shy, frail teenager to an empowered dragon rider. Violet doesn’t look like her world’s ideal rider: far from being physically imposing, she’s a slender, pretty, silver-haired girl, who suffers from a chronic illness that makes her vulnerable to tearing muscles and breaking bones. She begins the novel as a reluctant participant in the violence and ambition of the Riders Quadrant of Basgiath War College. Her deceased father was a Scribe, and Violet had always planned to follow in his footsteps. She excelled at all aspects of life in the Scribe’s quarter, as she has an inquiring and insatiable mind and a talent for solving difficult problems through force of intellect. However, she’s thrust into life as a cadet—a trainee dragon rider, a group with a survival rate at graduation of 30%—due to her mother Lilith Sorrengail’s insistence. Lilith is the General of the Navarrian army, a woman with an absolutely brutal and unrelenting sense of ambition and a draconian vision of how justice should be dealt. She and her country are at war with the gryphon fliers of neighboring Poromiel, and have recently weathered a seditionist uprising that left many noble families decimated, their surviving children scarred with magical tattoos called “Rebellion relics.”
Violet’s sister Mira is a dragon rider fighting gryphon fliers away from Navarrian border outposts, and her brother Brennan is believed to have died fighting rebels in the Uprising. The Sorrengail family are essentially Navarrian aristocracy, with a longstanding reputation as military royalty. However, Violet and her mother and sister are despised by the many children of the Rebellion who lost parents to Lilith’s brutal clearings and executions. Violet is bewildered by her mother’s insistence that she become a rider with only a few months to prepare, especially because her aforementioned small stature and chronic pain condition make her an unlikely candidate for the physically demanding role, and her family name would make her a target for the many Marked cadets who are proving their loyalty to Navarre by training as riders for its army’s dragons. Despite this, she decides that she will make the best of her terrifying circumstances and flings herself wholly into becoming the best cadet and rider she can be. She quickly proves herself to be a rider to watch, as she succeeds despite vicious treatment from several classmates and multiple attempts on her life. Initially focused on simply making it through each day without succumbing to her vulnerabilities, Violet grows increasingly aware of the darker aspects of the military institution and the political landscape surrounding it. Basgiath and Navarre might not be all they seem.
During her time in the Riders Quadrant, Violet and her classmates undergo a series of grueling challenges and tests in the hopes of becoming dragon riders. Dragons are ancient, powerful beings who live co-operatively with humans but who operate according to their own laws–laws which do not always recognize humans as equals. Several of Violet’s classmates are turned to ash and smoke in front of her eyes, and many more aspirant riders are left without dragons to bond with. Violet is the first rider in history to bond with two dragons; the legendary, colossal black dragon Tairn, and the golden feathertail dragon Andarna. She becomes even more of a target for violence when this happens. She only manages to survive because of her unending refusal to give up, her intelligence, the support of her friends, and—most of all—her enemy-turned-lover Xaden Riorson.
Violet is repeatedly told to stay away from Xaden and the other Marked cadets before she gets to the Riders Quadrant, and for good reason: Xaden swears to kill her himself, as revenge for her mother’s crimes against the Rebels and his city of Aretia. However, this quickly changes. Xaden and Violet seem fated to be together, however much they struggle against it. This is partially because of their undeniable physical attraction, but it’s also inevitable because their dragons Tairn and Sgaeyl are a mated pair. Dragons communicate telepathically with each other and with human–bonded dragons and riders take up permanent real estate in each other’s minds. Violet is bonded to Tairn, and Tairn’s survival depends on the survival of his mate Sgaeyl (and vice versa); if Sgaeyl dies, Xaden dies. It suddenly becomes Xaden’s number one obligation to make sure that Violet doesn’t die in the infinite number of ways Basgiath offers. Violet has to navigate falling in love with someone whose life’s purpose is to hate her, surviving in a world that wants nothing more than to destroy her. On top of all this, darkness is encroaching from an unsettling and new source of evil from the eastern Barrens. Through Violet, Fourth Wing suggests that resilience, adaptability, and sheer bloody-minded stubbornness are vital ingredients for survival in Navarre.
