REVIEW: Dark Age (RR, #5)
We’re now up to the second book of the Iron Gold trilogy of Red Rising, one I had to pick up immediately after the insane cliffhanger at the end of Iron Gold. I finished in a little over the week, despite it being the longest and the most dense in the series.
Let’s emphasize that part — Dark Age is a dense book. Coming at ~277,000 words, it’s the longest book in the series, and it makes sense. The plot unfolds on three avenues, between the assault on Mercery, the conflict in the Senate on Lune, and on Mars, which…
…whew.
Things get messy, though, when we look at the factions within those plots. I loved how this was where everything set up in Iron Gold really started to overlap, despite the solar system-wide distance. Mustang is trying to convene with the Senate to send forces to help Darrow on Mercury, joined by Sevro hunting the Syndicate for capturing their kids. Speaking of said kids, over on Mars, they and Ephraim were rescued by Sefi and the Obsidians, though they’re being lowkey used as hostages for Sefi to take her people’s mines from the Republic. Lyria and Volga, meanwhile, have been captured by Victra, but everything on Mars shifts when they’re attacked by Volsung Fa.
We’d be here all day if I talked about the entire plot. I highly recommend you read it yourself before reading further, but for the Peerless that have, let’s pay some attention to that title.
Dark Age.
In a literal sense, yeah, there’s an action scene later on where an EMP goes off on a city on Mercury and takes out the power, plunging them into a literal Dark Age. In the metaphorical sense, though, every plotline has a moment where shit hits the fan.
REALITY FOR THE REAPER
I can’t pinpoint a singular moment for Darrow. All of Mercury is death and slaughter and more war. When he frees his captain and puts her to work piloting Storm Gods (insane name btw) against the Society’s forces, out of revenge, she pushes it so far that Darrow has to kill her only after millions have died and the planet is ravaged.
It’s horrible. He’s a force of nature, here. Scenes from Lysander’s perspective on the other side of the Siege of Mercury show how it feels to fight Darrow, and from his perspective, the man’s a force of death, while from Darrow’s perspective, he’s a one-sentence footnote. He’s…
LIGHT RESISTANCE
Meanwhile, for Mustang, Danger, and the rest of the Senate…the Day of Red Doves. Dancer dies in the midst of a coup, and I felt horrible losing a literal DAY ONE. We then get to meet the mastermind behind the coup, the Abomination: a clone of the Jackal, a central antagonist of the last trilogy. It return felt cheap, but it makes sense for him to come back, and hearing how he made Sevro listen to his Howlers get cooked alive was haunting.
I have more thoughts about him after finishing the entire series so far, but let’s bring our eyes to Mars.
Two fronts. Lyria and Volga on Victra’s ship. Ephraim and the kids with Sefi.
Everything is ravaged by the arrival of Volsung Fa. As an antagonist, he went insane in this book, as an invincible, powerful presence. His attack led Victra to get close with Lyria and Volga as they fled, and they helped her give birth…just for the baby to be killed in the very next chapter.
Nailed to a tree.
Lyria, at least, did a turnaround here, as she finally started making active moves as a character. She freed Volga and Victra, and Ephraim helped magnify her call for help to destroy the terrorist Red Hand. But immediately after that…things get so much worse.
Ephraim.
Volsung Fa dueled Sefi for her leadership and mutilates her, ripping her back open and pulling her heart out to eat it then and there, while she was still alive. The goat Ephraim then set off a bomb, killing Sefi’s traitorous right-hand man and trying to take Fa with him too, but Fa survived.
And he eats Ephraim’s heart.
AND SO...?
There’s no light at the end of the tunnel. My boy Cassius returning and saving Darrow from Mercury is a flash, but emphasis on saving him from Mercury.
The Society, and Lysander, wins.
Mustang and her allies return to Mars to take a final stand against the Society, while Volga surrenders to Fa and the Obsidians to make them leave, and Ephraim is, well, dead. Lysander, on the other hand, has a complete reverse of an arc, rising to further power. The fact that the bad guys really do win, pushing our gang into a darker place, would make me rank it higher in the series if it wasn’t for Morning Star, or Golden Son, or the very next book.
Cause no matter how dark things get, there’s always a light.
There’s always a Lightbringer.