Let's conclude this series with book three. Spoilers ahead. Also, content warning for mentions of incest in this review (and the book, of course).
Jan and his herd return and are dead-set on attacking the wyverns in a year's time so they can reclaim their homeland. However, before this can happen Korr goes mad and runs away from the herd. Jan goes after him in order to learn of a dark secret. Meanwhile, Tek is left to look after the herd.
Okay, so, I overall liked this book. It has some really high highs, but also a few aspects that made me go "huh. We're doing this?"
I'll get the negatives out of the way first. First of all, Jan is way too passive in this book. Like, in the grand scheme of things he barely does anything here. He goes to look for Korr, learns his secret, travels a bit, and then spends most of the book in a cave with a dragon just sitting around watching stuff happen through visions in a pool. He doesn't actually do something until the very climax of the book. And this is our main protagonist we're talking about. All this book I kept waiting for Jan to do something, anything, of note, but for most of the book he's just super passive and not proactive in the slightest. Which is frustrating to read. I know that last book Jan also wasn't the most proactive, but there he had an excuse because he had amnesia. Here he's fully himself and yet he still does nothing for most of the book. Characters like Tek and Lell are way more proactive here.
Also, this book seems to have quite a few things happen simply because of plot conveniences. For example, early on they suddenly find out a way to poison-proof the unicorn herd against the wyvern's tail barbs. And the way this happens just feels too out-of-nowhere and plot-convenient and isn't really properly set up. It just kinda felt like the author wanted to quickly make up an excuse to poison-proof the herd.
Another aspect that felt super-convenient and like the author was just making stuff up at the last minute: the Tek/Jan incest subplot. Okay, so during this book, Jan finds out that he and his partner Tek are related because Korr fathered both of them in secret. This leads to Jan just not knowing how to comprehend this, because it'd mean that Tek is the true heir, and also that obviously he's in love with his half-sister. And this is a major plot-point as the book focuses heavily on it. So it's not like it's something that's quickly forgotten about. And it does lead to quite a bit of drama for Jan and Tek but Jan especially.
But then, in the final few pages, suddenly it turns out that, nope, Jan and Tek are not related at all. Turns out both of their parents just conveniently happened to cheat or be already pregnant in exactly such a way that Jan and Tek are not related at all. And this twist was not properly set up. Unlike the possible-incest twist of Korr cheating and (hypothetically) being Tek's father, which did have proper buildup. So it literally feels like the author was making up an excuse last-minute as to why Tek and Jan being partners isn't weird at all, actually. And it wasn't properly set up and just feels way too convenient. I don't know, this felt frustrating. It's not like I prefer incest in my stories (I prefer none, actually), but from a writing-POV if the author had actually committed to the "Tek and Jan are related"-plot point it would've worked away better than her making up some last-minute excuse to nullify it.
Ah well, that's enough negatives. Let's get to some stuff I really liked. First of all, Tek and Lell. I love these characters. They're so proactive and well-written and they truly get the time to shine here. They're just easily my favorite characters out of the entire series. They're also legit impressive in how Tek leads and how both Tek and Lell are able to, at least for a while, hold their own against the threatening wyvern king.
We also are introduced to some new side characters like Calyndor and the dragon queen and, yeah, they're neat. We also get some new locations and I liked really getting to know Tek and Jan's foals as characters, as well as Lell, of course, who was mostly a background character in earlier books.
The best part of the book is probably the climax though, holy shit was it intense. It had me on the edge of my seat reading and it just kept going and getting more epic as time went on.
So yeah, this book has some frustrating aspects, but overall I quite liked it still. I do consider it a solid conclusion to the series.
Rating: 3.5/5
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