War of Wyverns by S.F. Williamson

Here is a summary with spoilers for War of Wyverns by S.F. Williamson

Vivien Featherswallow has been suffering and doesn’t know what to do ever since the battle that took her boy Atlas away from her. Along with that, she hasn’t seen her cousin Marquis and her sister in weeks, and she feels utterly alone. The one constant she has had is the dragon Chumana, who showed up a few days after the battle to keep her company. Her world has turned on her as well, now that she is the face of the rebellion movement. She now is posing as Professor Hollingsworth’s niece, and she wants to be a spy, but no one is giving her the time of day to do anything.

Vivien decides to go out on a recon mission herself, wanting to prove herself, but she gets caught very quickly by Prime Minister Wyvernmire herself. Instead of going to a prison, Wyvernmire takes Viv with her out to the isles, where they run into her nephew Ralph. Wyvernmire takes her opportunity of having Viv seriously, and wants her to start translating again, but this time out on the island. Viv doesn’t want to, though when she is in her room all alone with her equipment, she is tempted to listen, just because it has been weeks since she has listened to dragons. The first thing she hears is “hello human girl”. When Viv looks outside she sees dragons, and in the distance a horse with a human rider. Once Viv sneaks outside, she realizes that the rider is Atlas. He and Marquis have come to save her. After a very quick fight, with not many casualties, they grab Viv and take her to the rebel camp.

Viv doesn’t focus too much on the camp, she is just so happy to see Atlas alive, and to see her family again. Though her happiness turns to anger quickly when she finds out that the reason Atlas lived was thanks to Chumana and her blood. Chumana saved Atlas the day of the battle, and at any point in the last few weeks Chumana could have told Viv that he was alive; in fact everyone in the rebellion movement knew that Atlas was alive, it was just her that did not know. So when Chumana came back around to the camps, Viv let her anger be known, and Chumana burned down some buildings on her way out.

They decide that now that they have Viv they should go on a mission to find the wyverns. They have an old journal that started the translations, and they should try and go find them under the guise of learning the language, but in reality, they are going to try and get them to fight in their war. For weeks Vivien, Sophie, Marquis, and Atlas travel together until they find the tunnels and eventually find the wyverns. They are welcomed, and thanks to Viv’s small knowledge of their language, they let them in. They decide on a cultural exchange, and the two species start to swap knowledge; though the wyverns say they have no reason to join their rebellion.

After some time being together, one of the wyverns comes to Viv and asks her to continue the translation that the journal started, to start a full translation between their languages. For Viv she feels like this is a super nice sign of respect. Though the others in her party feel like their visit is a waste of time knowing they won’t join the fight, they just want to get back to the revolution. The humans are invited to an egg ceremony though, and Viv finds it to be an incredible experience. She has never seen or felt anything like it before, and she tells the wyverns that there is no way she can translate that event into the human language. They understand, but are sad by it. Though soon after, they find that the group brought their translation equipment, and the wyverns feel completely betrayed. Viv tries to smooth things over, but it ends with a battle where wyverns end up dying and the tunnels get sealed up with the four humans on the outside. They need to get back to the rebels, and Viv feels like she has failed.

When they do get back to the isles, they run into Ralph, and find that Chumana has been captured by Wyvernmire. Chumana tells her to leave, and that she will find a way out. When the group gets back to the rebels, things are looking bleak, despite them being gone for only a few days. Though when Atlas and Viv meet with Hollingsworth, she notices that Atlas looks cagey. It’s then she realizes that Atlas has been working with Hollingsworth the whole time, he has had an ulterior motive the whole time he was with her, and it was all for the rebel movement; none of it was to help the wyverns. It was to basically give Vivien up to the Bulgarians for peace. Viv hates that he picked a side and it wasn’t hers, and that it felt like he harmed the wyverns even more than was needed.

While with Marquis explaining what happened with Hollingsworth and Atlas, wyverns appear, and Hollingsworth comes out as well. She reveals that she can speak a little bit of their tongue. It turns out that she grew up in the tunnels with the wyverns before she and her family were kicked out. Viv is angry that she was sent in unaware of everything about the wyverns when Hollingsworth had a lot of firsthand account that could have been helpful. Hollingsworth asks and pleads for the wyverns’ help in the war; they start to agree, they won’t help in words but they will help in teeth.

Quickly the Battle of Compass Hills begins and the wyverns do join, only to defend their home. Wyvernmire and her dragons appear as well, and it is an all out fight. The dragon Goranov is being ridden by Ralph, who comes swooping by and shoots at Chumana, and it hits its mark. Chumana goes down, and Viv holds Chumana as she dies; though Chumana tells Viv to make sure to work on herself and not focus so much on the war. The battle still goes on though, even though Viv’s world has been shattered, the wyverns go for a united kill and go for Goranov. Viv and Atlas are reunited and they kill a dragon together as well. Things start to look bleak though, until foreign dragons arrive and help turn the battle in their favor. During the fight Prime Minister Wyvernmire is assassinated, and Viv is there to witness the whole thing, thus ending the whole battle quickly.

As things quiet down, Atlas comes to officially apologize to Viv, and then continues to tell her he doesn’t want to live without her, and starts to propose to her. Viv tells him that is moving too fast, but that she does forgive him, and they can start from there. But she also wants to find herself, just as Chumana told her to do.

Also part of finding herself is to get rid of all of the translation equipment, and maybe go back to a normal life. Though that changes drastically when all of the sudden Goranov, whom they thought dead, arrives and swoops up Marquis from the ground. It all happens so fast that there is nothing they can do; Marquis is gone.

In an epilogue, Vivien has returned to her sister back in London, but it is not the same. The victory is not celebrated because her cousin is gone, and Viv just realized that she is willing to do whatever is needed to get him back.