Xaden (A Tale of Threshing Day)
Hello, all. Welcome back to the review of Threshing Day, a supplemental anthology for The Empyrean.
No burying the lead: “Xaden” is a story that pissed me off, and not because it was bad all the way through.
It was decent at the beginning. Not great, but the potential was there. It demonstrated that Yarros writing Xaden as a sexual object and sock puppet really has been a deliberate choice this whole time, rather than her being incapable of writing him as a character with his own goals and agency. Then, as the plot continued, she chose to return to lazy writing, with the story’s own internal continuity (without even needing to look at the series continuity) tearing open gaping plot holes that Yarros doesn’t bother to acknowledge.
Buckle into those Special Snowflake dragon saddles. It’s time to purge some initiates.
STATS
Title: “Xaden”
Series: The Empyrean (Supplemental Anthology)
Author(s): Rebecca Yarros
Genre: Fantasy (Epic)
First Printing: September 29th, 2026
Publisher: Red Tower Books
SPOILERS & DISCLAIMER
This post will provide heavy, unmarked spoilers for the entirety the Threshing Day anthology up through the end of the story being featured. Mild, unmarked stories for later stories may also be provided, while any heavy spoilers for later stories will be confined to clearly marked sections. I will do my best to keep the first paragraph of every section spoiler-free.
Heavy, unmarked spoilers will also be provided for all mainline books of The Empyrean (Fourth Wing, Iron Flame, and Onyx Storm) released prior to Threshing Day. I’m going to assume that you’ve read those previous reviews, but it won’t be necessary to understand this review, as I’ll be doing my best to recap or reference recurring issues or prior canon as it comes up.
For more information regarding the standards by which I’m going to be rating these stories, please see the post titled “Focus and Continuity (A Prelude to Threshing Day)”.
WHAT WE KNEW ABOUT XADEN BEFORE THRESHING DAY
Xaden is a great example of a character defined more by What he is rather than Who he is.
He is the Bad Boy Love Interest. The Shadow Daddy. The most egotistical asshole in an organization of “egotistical assholes”. A thug and a brute who only succeeds because the plot makes his opponents selectively incompetent and stupid. The Edgelord leader of an underdog rebellion whose principles bend in whatever direction is necessary to punch up at the Man in a given scene. A hot-tempered animal who becomes a whipped dog when the self-insert Mary Sue needs to scream at him, then turns into an animal again to gratify her sexually. He loves Violet because he exists for her wish fulfillment, validating her in all the ways she wants and never finding fault in her.
It may sound like I described a well-rounded character, but it is important to keep that last point in mind. Xaden exists entirely to cater to Violet’s story. Every facet of his being is tailored to let Violet swoon or cause drama or feel good about herself. When consistent characterization would demand that he exist as a person with his own needs, motivations, or desires, Yarros collapsed that element to keep Violet in focus. To name just a few examples:
Xaden does not blame Violet for getting Liam killed. After all, if she had not meddled in his affairs by stalking him and asking questions about what he gets up to outside of classes, Dain would never have been able to view damning information about said affairs.
He indulges Violet when she equates sex with a security clearance and further endangers his smuggling operation with her independent activities, even sharing domestic existence with her over multiple months while she refuses to commit to a relationship to him, even though it would be far more logical for him to dump the delusional narcissist with whom he only had a couple one-night stands.
His struggles as a venin are secondary to Violet not getting laid.
Despite supposedly being all about saving the innocent, he turns a blind eye to Violet threatening to murder his preteen brothers.
Bear in mind that Xaden is also the second-most used POV in this series. He got a chapter in every mainline book, plus the three bonus content chapters from Fourth Wing. Even with him acting as the lens through which we perceive the story, his entire existence is geared around Violet.
All this is to say that Xaden is not a character. I doubt Yarros even views him as a person. He has, thus far, been nothing but an object to facilitate masturbation.
CONTENT
On his Threshing Day, Xaden and the other rebel children scatter into the forest in pairs (explicitly to avoid being executed for breaking the Codex restriction against groupings of three or more). Garrick goes with him, and they discuss their love lives. The pair are then jumped by Prince Alic, who plans to humiliate them and feed them to a dragon.
This plan is interrupted by the arrivals for first Sgaeyl, then Masen (thereby blocking Melgren’s future sight). Xaden uses the opportunity to kill Alic. Sgaeyl then steps in to destroy evidence of the killing by burning the bodies of Alic and his cronies. She and Xaden have a brief chat and how his great-uncle was actually his grandfather, and she claims him as her rider.
ANALYSIS
Plot & Worldbuilding
Yarros has a unique gift for turning even the shortest stories into cannibalistic narratives.
Future Sight, Addendum 5.3 & Regicide
I’m not going to rehash all of the narrative issues with the mishandling of Melgren’s Signet across this series, the inconsistency about rebel children gathering and even just being allowed to live when they block Melgren’s Signet, and the contradictory relationship between the riders and the royalty of Navarre. Those issues still exist, and this story enflames all of them, but I don’t need to bring wider continuity up to explain how they open plot holes in “Xaden”. I just need to accept everything Yarros tells us here at face value and follow the logical chain of cause and effect.
The rebel children are still bound by Addendum 5.3 during Threshing. If they are caught grouped up in the valley, they will be executed.
The presence of three rebel children in one place blocks Melgren’s Signet.
The rebel children are all maligned as guilty of the sins of their parents.
If Xaden violates his agreement with General Sorrengail by commiting a murder, all the rebel children will be executed.
Xaden cannot kill Alic during Threshing. Alic is a prince of Navarre, which apparently overrules the normal bloodbath of the Quadrant. What’s more, Melgren’s Signet will grant instant knowledge of Xaden’s guilt if he kills Alic, leading to the execution of all rebel children.
So, naturally, when Alic dies, Melgren consults his Signet (or simply realizes that he didn’t see Alic’s death when he should have been able to). This necessarily means that three rebel children were gathered in one place. Whether or not one of the rebel children did the deed (naturally, everyone will blame them), the Codex violation is self-evident. Xaden and all rebel children will be executed. The charred bodies will be a curiosity at best or proof that Sgaeyl is a traitor to the Empyrean at worst.
Yarros went out of her way to make this the inevitable conclusion. She established these various factors to drive up tension and force the encounter with Alic to follow a specific path.
…
She then ignored the consequences, because acknowledging them would mean that the mainline books never happened.
Sign Language
Xaden and Garrick coordinate their effort to overpower Alic … using sign language.
Originally, I was going to praise this as maybe explaining that the rebel children learned sign language as a means to covertly communicate. That would be a start for patching up the mess that is sign language in this setting. However, that doesn’t really work, because it would not explain why Rhiannon and Ridoc were also already fluent.
Then I double-checked and found that the reason Xaden gets away with signing in front of Alec and his cronies is that none of them see his hands, while Garrick can.
“Does he have any other weapons on you?” I use my hands to sign close to my body, avoiding the three behind us but catching Garrick’s attention. “Blink once for no. Twice for yes.”
This is the same arbitrary nonsense Yarros used in Chapter 29 of Iron Flame. This time does makes slight sense - at least Alic and the cronies are behind Xaden, rather than being between Garrick and him - but they still have a strong incentive to watch his hands, so this working is still dependent on characters acting against their own desires. Plus, we are told Xaden can only see the “whites” of Garrick's eyes. Unless Garrick turns his head to look at Xaden’s hands (which would give up the game), he is probably also working with limtied peripheral vision, yet he is able to comprehend sign language being conducted with as little movement as possible?
Lineage
Sgaeyl reveals Xaden's true lineage to him, thereby explaining how no one caught on to the fact that Xaden is riding his
“We have that in common, grandson of Maxim Riorson.” She lowers her head to a combat position.
My brow furrows and pain flares again as my left eye begins to swell shut. “I’m the grandson of Corbin Riorson. Maxim was my great-uncle.”
She blinks. “If your grandmother said so, I suppose.”
What the fuck? My mind races. Would that mean… No. Dad is the oldest twin and—
“Don’t overthink it.”
When Yarros has Sgaeyl say, “Don’t overthink it,” she is telling the audience not to think about it. And indeed, if we do not think about it, this works. It is a surprise to Xaden. This implies that only Sgaeyl, Maxim, and Xaden’s grandmother knew the truth, which would mean that the scribes would not have the necessary information to notice that Xaden was not developing a second Signet or going mad.
And I would give Yarros kudos for closing a plot hole … except, you know, I think while reading these books. So I remember how this plot hole opened in the first place, back in Chapter 58 of Iron Flame.
“And when my ability to control shadows seemed stronger than they’d expected, they had no reason to dig deeper.” A corner of his mouth tilts upward. “It helps that rider of record was thought to be a great uncle, not my grandfather.”
“She’s really the only one who knows?”
“She’s it. She made me promise not to tell anyone. She thinks anyone who knows will have me killed—or use me as a weapon.”
Why, exactly, would anyone have any reason to dig deeper if this really was a secret? Why would the records “help” if no one questioned Xaden’s ancestry in the first place?
What Yarros previously established was that there was uncertainty about Xaden’s heritage. People knew about this. There had to be reasons given why they did not figure out the truth. Telling us now Xaden did not know doesn’t magically undo this. So either the initial plot hole opened by the incompetence / rider leadership is still open, or else Yarros is contradicting herself. The old plot hole does not close without opening a new one.
Xaden
He is a Bad Boy. The most egotistical asshole in an organization of “egotistical assholes”. A thug and a brute who only succeeds because the plot makes his opponents selectively incompetent and stupid. The Edgelord leader of an underdog rebellion. A hot-tempered animal.
Yes, this is effectively the same as the object we previously covered … except now, he possesses these traits wholly outside of Violet. He exists as his own entity. The result is a shallow character, but a character nonetheless. Whether he remains a character depends on whether Yarros reduces him back to an object once the mainline books resume or else allows him to continue existing independently to (or perhaps even in opposition to) Violet.
That said, Yarros slips far too easily into breaking others down rather than building Xaden up. The altercation with Alic relies entirely on Alic and his allies being unlikable and stupid, rather than Xaden being skilled or clever. At best, Yarros struggles to write Xaden without his god-tier shadow powers.
Sgaeyl
Sgaeyl is a … violent sociopath … ready to do what is necessary …
Huh.
Really the main thing that sets her aside from Teine is that she wants Xaden to be brutal, rather than resilient. She judged him worthy when she executed Alic.
This is still characterization, but it is very thin.
Tairn
“You are a dragon of the Empyrean, mated to Tairn, the second-largest dragon on the Continent. It’s common knowledge that he lost his last rider because of my father’s rebellion, so I’m not sure how he’d feel about…me.”
“He’s not the one making the choice, is he?” Steam blasts across my face, so hot that I half expect my skin to blister, and holy fuck it hurts. “He will live with my decision, and I suspect one day I’ll have to live with his.”
Don’t question her choices. Noted.
Wow. Tairn doesn't even appear in this story, yet we get confirmation that he has no agency.
RATING: 3/10
I was riding high after “Mira”. When Yarros opened “Xaden” by confirming that his characterization extends consistently beyond Violet, I foolishly had hope. I thought this story would also be worthy of 7/10, if not more.
Then Alic entered the story, and the story dissolved into nonsense. Far too many pages are spent to make Xaden killing Alic feel justified, and despite making him incompetent, Yarros still has to tear open a plot hole to get Xaden out of the mess she could have just not written him into. And then the interaction with Sgaeyl is about as substantive as the interaction between Brennan and Marbh.
To return to what I said at the top: this story irritates me not because it is uniformly bad. It irritates me because it proves Yarros can do better, yet consistently chooses not to.
SPEAKING OF CHOOSING NOT TO DO BETTER …
Next Sunday, we review “Garrick”. This story was the first in the anthology to not just annoyed me but actively make me angry. Not only does it not have an actual story to it, but it also features a perfect example of Yarros lying to the audience, projecting it onto the characters, and then not realizing that the lie breaks the story even further. It’s more than a little insulting that Yarros expects no one to think this lie through.
In the interim, if you’re looking for your fix of gritty fantasy, my free serial Moral Support is ongoing. It’s a Dark Fantasy story where motorbike-riding Persian alchemists face off against medieval Balkan soldiers in a haunted forest. Chapter 1 through Chapter 4 are now available!
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