Sliseag
A spoiler-free guide to Fourth Wing, Iron Flame & Onyx Storm (The Empyrean).
Only showing what’s been revealed up to your current progress. Future events, identities, and relationships are hidden.
Overview
Sliseag is Sawyer’s bonded dragon, identified after Threshing as a Red Swordtail.
After Sawyer’s injury, Sliseag and Sawyer continue as a fighting rider-dragon pair, with Sliseag actively involved in Sawyer’s return to the saddle and present again against wyvern.
Appearance
Sliseag has red coloring that is familiar enough to serve as a visual comparison for a flushed face.
Relationships
Sawyer is Sliseag’s rider, and their bond is established when Sliseag chooses him at Threshing.
Sawyer’s fear about returning to flight is partly bound up with Sliseag: he says Sliseag is not Tairn, refuses to ask his dragon for exceptions, and notes that Sliseag already risked bonding a repeat.
Sliseag pushes back against Sawyer’s reluctance through their bond rather than acting as a passive mount. Frustrated with Sawyer’s view of accommodation, he steams Violet and Sawyer, bares his teeth, and lowers his left front leg through the mud into a walkable incline so Sawyer can reach the saddle without treating the adjustment as dishonor.
Abilities and Skills
Sliseag can pass practical field information to Sawyer through their bond, including enough detail about the fliers’ altitude problems and gryphon exhaustion for Sawyer to judge their vulnerability.
Sliseag uses his swordtail in close combat, cutting into an attacking wyvern’s foreleg before trying to bite its neck. The same fight shows a limitation: he cannot snap the wyvern’s neck quickly enough while Sawyer is in danger on his back.
Important Events
Sliseag joins the visible dragons at the flight field when Tairn forces Varrish to acknowledge dragon autonomy and apologize, lowering his head with Feirge, Aotrom, and the others in the collective response.
At Basgiath, Sliseag carries Sawyer into a fight against three wyvern, including one bearing a rider. When Sawyer is bitten and nearly pulled off, Sliseag cannot freely defend himself without risking his rider, and Violet removes Sawyer from his back so Sliseag can maneuver; afterward, the wounded dragon lands behind Tairn near Violet’s group.
During the defense that sends Sawyer to the lower sector, Sliseag launches north and takes position at the north gate before fighting in the confined pass. He joins Feirge and Aotrom as one of three dragons intercepting wyvern in vertical formation and finishes a kill hundreds of feet below Rhiannon.