Resson · The full story

Start to grief.

A border trading post most riders had never heard of, where the war stopped being a rumour and started taking people we loved.

The stand

They chose to fight a battle they were meant to lose.

Xaden's riot finds Athebyne abandoned and a letter from Colonel Aetos: defend Resson's civilians from venin, or leave them to it. They were sent here to die. Syrena's gryphon fliers intercept them with the same warning, and everyone stays anyway. Riders and fliers, back to back, for three hundred strangers.

The dead zone

This is what venin actually do, and no one warned them.

A venin channels raw power straight from the earth and the ground dies around them — grass, hillside, soil going grey and crumbling outward. Soleil and Fuil step into one and desiccate where they stand. Kill the venin and its wyvern drops. Violet learns the rules of this war by watching people die to them.

The cover-up

The lie that finally used up her patience.

Resson is charred for miles, so Navarre files it as Poromish unrest and relocates the quarterly trade like nothing happened. Not a mistake — a policy. The kingdom would rather bury a slaughter than admit the venin are real. Violet stops giving Basgiath the benefit of the doubt right about here.

The Battle of Resson

Start to grief.

Resson is the hinge the whole series turns on — the day the conspiracy stopped being Xaden's paranoid theory and became something Violet bled for. Here's the battle, start to grief.

01
Athebyne, abandoned
War Games sends the squad to the outpost at Athebyne. They arrive to find it empty — and a sealed letter waiting for Xaden.
02
The choice
Aetos's orders: defend Resson's civilians from venin they were never supposed to survive, or abandon them. They choose to fight.
03
Fliers and riders
Syrena Cordella's gryphon drift intercepts them to warn of the attack. Two peoples who don't trust each other agree to die together for a town.
04
The wyvern come
Venin channel from the clock tower; wyvern pour in from the valley. Tairn torches the tower, but a venin general survives the fire. Civilians shelter in the mines.
05
Soleil, then Liam
Soleil and Fuil die in a dead zone. Deigh is torn apart shielding Tairn, and the broken bond takes Liam — who dies in Violet's arms asking her to protect Sloane.
06
The last venin
Grief-steadied, Violet finds her aim and puts lightning through the last venin. Its wyvern falls out of the sky.
07
Carried out
Poisoned by a venin's dagger, Violet goes down and wakes three days later in Aretia — healed by a brother she'd buried six years ago.

← Back to Resson

We're Caffeine and Curses. The Library started as my design research — so we keep the notes here where everyone can use them. The pages are fan-made, not official; the licensed designs are in the shop.

Officially licensed