Lying awake in her dorm, Medra feels a pang of envy for Florence’s new bond with Nyxaris and mourns her own lost connection, feeling like a “dragonless rider.” Her thoughts are interrupted by a late-night visit from Blake, who insists he “needed” to see her, despite the discourtesy of him dropping in unpermitted in House Avari. They flirt with each other, Medra finding herself aroused by Blake’s possessiveness. Blake demands she admit she wants him; she agrees on the condition that he admit he belongs to her. He accepts immediately.

Medra and Blake have passionate sex. Afterward, they discuss their families. Medra reveals her fae mother died in childbirth. Medra’s human father—the king—also died the night she was born; he had spent his last night sending soldiers to slaughter newborns trying to find and kill Medra. Blake shares that his mother was a halfborn who vanished into the Sanctum, with his Uncle Viktor as the only, untrustworthy source of information about her. Blake also admits to secretly passing out food and medicine with Rodriguez’s help in Veilmar’s slums to blightborn families, especially children who had lost someone to highbloods. They discuss the growing political threat from Viktor and Regan. As Blake sleeps, Medra is horrified to see his ruined eye is open and glowing blood-red, a disturbing similarity to Viktor.

Regan—now using the name Regan Drakharrow—presides over a faculty meeting to implement a series of oppressive new rules targeting blightborn students. These include a mandatory blue and silver uniform for blightborns of all years for easy identification, a strict curfew, and restricted access to the library and greenhouse. Professor Rodriguez and a visiting scholar, Vasanti Allenvale, protest the discriminatory measures, but Regan dismisses their concerns.

Regan announces that blightborn combat classes will be moved to a moldy, dilapidated gymnasium and introduces a “Blood Donation Incentive Program” that encourages highbloods to feed on blightborns. She asserts that these changes are effective immediately under the authority of her archon, Viktor Drakharrow. After the meeting, flanked by her personal “Bloodguard,” Regan feels sickened by her own actions and is haunted by the image of Headmaster Kim’s head, which Viktor had slammed onto a spike. She then sees Neville, Blake’s pet fluffin, watching her with what she interprets as a look of judgment.

The atmosphere at Bloodwing has grown even more tense and hostile under Regan’s new rules. In a hallway, Medra witnesses a highblood student openly feeding on a dwarven thrall named Dani. After the highblood departs, a group of angry blightborn students led by a boy named Lochlan surrounds Dani. They verbally assault her, calling her a collaborator for wearing the colors of a highblood house, and then physically attack her, spitting on her and ripping her dress.

Medra intervenes, but the mob turns on her, calling her “Drakharrow’s pet” and a traitor. She argues that Dani was controlled by thrallweave and had no choice, but no one listens to her defense. The students challenge Medra to prove her loyalty by using her dragon to fight for them. As Lochlan shoves her and the situation escalates, Florence appears and shouts for them to leave Medra alone, declaring that Nyxaris will listen to her.

As Medra tries to silence Florence, Lochlan attacks, putting Medra in a chokehold. The other students, led by a girl named Isha, threaten to let Lochlan kill Medra unless Florence reveals her connection to the dragon. With Lochlan’s grip tightening on Medra’s throat, Florence begins to scream “Nyxaris is mine”—the words cut short as Medra violently breaks free. Lochlan draws a knife, but Blake appears just in time and kills him by twisting his head at a grotesque angle. Blake moves to kill Isha next, but Medra’s shouting stops him.

Professor Amina Hassan arrives and takes Florence and Medra to the headmistress’s office, where Regan and Viktor are waiting. Hassan reveals what she overheard about Florence claiming Nyxaris listens to her. Medra denies Hassan’s testimony to save Florence. However, Viktor dismisses her, claiming he has noticed that Nyxaris and Medra no longer practice flying together. Viktor uses magic to brutally enter Florence’s mind and learn the truth, causing Florence excruciating pain as he searches her memories. Kage bursts in to defend Florence, but at that moment, Nyxaris appears outside the window, sensing Florence in pain. The dragon communicates with Florence, telling her that he needs to display his rage to curb the highbloods. He asks Florence to move to the door as Medra hides in a corner, before unleashing a torrent of fire that deliberately targets the desk, incinerating Hassan beneath it. Kage whips away Regan from harm and Viktor vanishes before the fire can reach him. Nyxaris commands Florence impatiently onto his back; she climbs up and they take flight.

After he kills Lochlan, Blake is shaken by the “red haze” of his uncontrollable rage and fears he will lose control and harm Medra. Realizing his draconic side is becoming a separate, violent entity, he seeks help from Kage, whom he knows to be also a shapeshifter. Kage informs him about Nyxaris’s attack on Regan’s office and that Medra is safe.

They discuss the oppressive new school rules and agree to form an alliance with Lysander of House Orphos to protect the blightborn students of their houses. They also recognize that Florence is now Viktor’s primary target; Blake resolves to have Medra warn Florence. The conversation turns to the purpose of Blake’s visit. Blake explains that he feels his dragon form is a separate being trying to take over him, which Kage—whose wolf form is an integrated part of him—finds strange. Kage tells Blake the sense of separation is not normal and advises Blake to seek out someone who understands the history of his condition, that is, Professor Rodriguez.

Blake goes to Rodriguez’s office and finds him drunk and despondent, with fresh bite marks on his neck from Larissa taking advantage of the new “Blood Donation” program. Blake is horrified at a professor being targeted and asks Rodriguez to fight back. Rodriguez tells Blake he has given up and feels responsible for the current chaos at the school. He thought he could outmaneuver Viktor, but failed spectacularly. Blake reminds Rodriguez that everyone made a mistake the night of the Frostfire ball by tricking Nyxaris. He offers the professor a handkerchief to wipe away his blood and asks for help about the dragon entity in him.

Rodriguez explains that there are two types of dragons: those who are born and those who are “made” through a combination of rider blood and blood magic, confirming that Medra’s blood catalyzed Blake’s transformation. Molindra was a born dragon, since her birth records show she hatched from an egg. Rodriguez further reveals that the four original dragons willingly allowed the Emberwatch to turn them to stone in order to hold back the Veil—a barrier between worlds, though he does not explain what the Veil actually does. He diagnoses Blake’s condition as “soul-splitting,” a dangerous internal division, and gives him an ancient book titled The Dark Art of Eternal Bonds for answers. Blake’s and Rodriguez’s meeting is interrupted by Visha, Blake’s Second (second in-command), whose arrival—and Rodriguez’s pretense that she is there to discuss an essay—strongly implies a romantic connection between them.

After her first flight on Nyxaris, Florence returns to the Avari tower and learns of a new trend of highbloods going “berserk” and murdering both blightborns and their own kind. She and Medra have a happy reunion where Florence apologizes for her recent distance. During their conversation, Nyxaris mentally interrupts, replacing “fledgling” with the new address “fireheart,” explaining that Florence is no longer a hatchling but a rider.

Kage summons Florence to his suite to meet his grandmother, Lady Elaria Avari. Lady Avari explains that Viktor will try to perform a forbidden “soul-binding” ritual to forcibly merge Florence’s soul with a highblood’s, thereby gaining control of Nyxaris. To protect her, Lady Avari proposes an immediate betrothal between Florence and Kage. With Nyxaris’s reluctant approval of the strategic alliance, Florence accepts. That night, she has a disturbingly vivid and erotic dream about Nyxaris and wakes to find the dragon is aware of its content, leaving her flustered and aroused.

Medra dreams she is back in Camelot, but the scene shifts and she hears the voice of her deceased mother, Orcades. Orcades reveals she is inhabiting Molindra and is with Marcus, Catherine, and Lunaya Orphos in a forest called the “Bonewood.” She explains that Marcus and Catherine are trying to pierce the “Veil,” a barrier between worlds guarded by the Bloodmaiden—the goddess Sangratha worships—herself. Marcus’s group’s goal is to bring back a “lost” part of Sangratha, and their efforts are creating “cracks” in the Veil.

Orcades warns that these cracks will build and that she is secretly working to sabotage Marcus’s and Catherine’s plan. She urges Medra to stay alive and protect Florence. Medra wakes, unsettled by the revelations. She considers telling Blake but decides against it, knowing he is keeping his own secrets. She reflects on their dangerous but unbreakable bond, recognizing that despite Blake’s questionable behavior in the past, he is fiercely loyal.