Check out our episode here! Silver Shadows by Richelle Mead
When we last left Sydney and Adrian, Sydney had been kidnapped by Alchemists and taken to reeducation and Adrian had just stopped taking his bipolar medication so he could wield spirit again. Now, Sydney is still in reeducation in the cold, drugged darkness for an unknowable amount of time, but the voice has finally offered her something she might actually want. A visit with her family. And no, she doesn’t want the visit to sob and repent and whatever else they actually want her to do, she wants to see them so she can get out of her cell and make a break for it, or at least be clear-minded enough to sleep well enough to dream. She’s about to put her acting skills and alchemist training to the test.
Adrian, meanwhile, is drunk. He’s still trying to find Sydney in dreams, but as long as the Alchemists are doing whatever it is they’re doing to her, he won’t be able to reach her. His life is not so great without Sydney. He’s barely passing his classes if he even goes to them and barely remembers his meetups with Jill. He thought he had that one under control, but when he takes the bus to Amberwood, he can’t get in touch with anyone. Turns out, they were at Jill’s end of semester fashion show and he was asleep on a bench. Not good, Adrian, not good at all. And Aunt Is there to let him know it. She's almost always around now, whispering in Adrian's ears. That is also not good. Trey, now Adrian's roommate, takes him home. A short while later, Adrian's MOTHER shows up, a week out of prison, and takes him back to Court. He tries to get help from Lissa and Rose to find the alchemist facilities, but Lissa can't/won't help. Then he runs into Nina, the spirit user who restored her sister in Fiery Heart. Maybe she'll help.
Sydney is taken from her dank cold cell and gets a hot shower! And clothes! And FOOD! Sheridan, the director of the facility, is terrible, but in that fake nice way that makes her even worse. Sydney is reinked, which she was dreading, but she still loved Adrian after it was over, so it seems that her magic use is still protecting her. She goes to classes with others in reeducation but immediately gets in trouble for asking the teacher if he had any proof of the blatant lies he was teaching about the Moroi. This earns Sydney a punishment called The Purge. She's given an injection that makes her terribly ill and is then made to watch happy Moroi, trying to force a Pavlovian response. Oh great. After this, she goes to art class where she maybe makes a friend, Duncan. The rest of her day goes, well, about as well as it can in an Alchemist reeducation facility, and then it's finally bedtime. Time to dream! Time to see Adrian!! But oh no … here comes the drugs again…
Adrian spends most of his time at Court with Nina going to parties. At one, the Dabblin' Bros from Fiery Heart make a scene and Adrian, who had stopped drinking for a brief period of time, froze one of them in his tracks with his Spirit and embarrassed him in front of everyone. Hopefully that won't come back to bite him. Adrian also goes to dinner at his parents' house where he discovers that their marriage is loveless and only for show and he is shocked. Daniela asks her son about the girl he's been pining for and where she is. She can't possibly love him if she's nowhere to be found. SO WHY DON'T WE TELL EVERYONE THAT SHE'S BEEN KIDNAPPED FOR THE LOVE OF FUCK?! Instead of revealing why his girlfriend and the love of his life is missing, Adrian goes out with Nina. He even stops looking for Sydney in dreams. He spends so much time with Nina, drunk at parties, that she thinks he has a thing for her and makes a move. This sobers him up and gets him back on track, thank goodness.
Warning! There's a big chunk of unimportant details here that we're leaving out. Wallowing Adrian makes us upset and Sydney constantly vomiting during The Purge is gross. There's a scene where Dimitri tells Adrian he's better than how he's acting and lots of Aunt Tatiana's whisperings. Sydney vomits a lot and sees the devastation of reeducation in those that don't have magic and the love of a sexy Moroi keeping them going. She sees Keith's name written on the wall where everyone writes their sins and realizes this is the facility where he was reeducated. That might be helpful! Anyway, now that Sydney and Adrian are kind of teamed up again, let's get back to the juicy details.
While Adrian is sobering up, Sydney makes some semblance of friends in reeducation and finally manages to block the gas flowing into her room and makes dream contact with Adrian after a few days. She tells him to get in touch with her sister Carly who might know how to find Keith who might know where the facility is. Her roommate, Emma, who Sydney thought was a terrible suck up, seems to want to escape as much as Sydney does. And so do the others! One guy, Jonah, got in a lot of trouble for something and was afraid he'd get a super reinking, the kind Sydney knew made Keith a dead-eyed robot. So, she charms some salt and manages to get a syringe and give it to Jonah just in the nick of time. He fakes his dead-eyed robot act and tells Sydney she saved him. Now Emma wants help too.
Adrian decides he's going to get help from Marcus in finding where Sydney is being held and heads back to Palm Springs. The crew meets up and Adrian finds out that he passed his classes. Hooray! Then he and Marcus go to Arizona where Carly is. She hates the Alchemists, so of course she's on board with helping, even if it involves Keith, because she loves Sydney. Keith is currently working a desk job in Idaho, so that's where they head next. They find Keith, who is still a miserable whiny piece of garbage, and discover the only things he knows about the reeducation facility. That it's somewhere with a dry heat in November and that he never ever wants to go back there. Marcus gets his contacts searching and they soon find out the facility is in Death Valley. Adrian talks to the gang again and Eddie and Trey plan to meet up with him and Marcus to rescue Sydney. If only Adrian could find her in dreams to let her know they're coming. But… he can't.
Adrian can't find Sydney because she got caught. Using an invisibility spell and gum she stole from a teacher, Sydney managed to sneak out of the room she shares with Emma. The first time went fine. She stole a key card and she gathered up lots of syringes and the ingredients she needed to make charmed ink. She passed out most of what she made and then went out again another night. This time didn't go so well. She doubled the invisibility spell and went out in search of a way to shut off the gas in the entire facility and find an exit. She passed Sheridan in the halls but luckily wasn't spotted. She saw an exit but couldn't get to it and also shut off the gas to the cells she shared with her new friends. On her way back up, she ran straight into Sheridan. Now strapped into an electric chair type torture device, along with Emma just to make things worse, Sydney reveals that she's a magic user to stop Sheridan from torturing her roommate. That's how she managed to sneak around the facility. And oh no, Sheridan doesn't like that. She's going to have to take drastic measures.
Adrian and co get together and create a plan involving dream contacting people he's never met or seen before, compulsion, fake IDs, golden lily makeup and fire. Adrian dream-contacts Duncan who Sydney had mentioned to him previously and then Duncan brings Emma into the dream. They devise a plan to set the facility on fire and get everyone out. Adrian spirit-conceals himself and he and Eddie and Trey go into the facility with fake IDs and lilies painted on their faces. They pretend to be from a rare, secret Alchemist department that deals with magic use and go right in the front door and talk to Sheridan. Meanwhile, Duncan and Emma set several fires while Marcus and his crew shut off the sprinkler system and wait outside to drive everyone to freedom.
It works pretty well until Sheridan learns that the detainees are fighting back and can't be knocked out with gas. Good job, Sydney! Then Marcus and his crew burst in with tranquilizers and take down most of the alchemist guards. Then the detainees burst out and everyone flees. Duncan and Emma are the last ones out… without Sydney. Unfortunately the level where Sydney is kept is still locked down. She, another detainee and two guards are down there. Adrian takes Sheridan's key card and he and Eddie set off into the fire to rescue Sydney and the others.
After some scuffles and zip ties, Adrian and Eddie rescued Sydney, Chantal and two worthless Alchemists. Chantal is Duncan's friend that he thought was long gone, so that will be a nice reunion. She almost mangles Sheridan, but everyone convinces her not to for some reason and then Sydney and Adrian take off in the Mustang while Marcus, Trey, Eddie and Chantal leave in a Prius. They were all supposed to go to one of Marcus's safe houses, probably in Mexico, but Sydney and Adrian have the idea that if they split up, if they run off to Vegas without everyone else, that will make them all safer. They were wrong.
They were caught almost immediately and had to blow up an SUV and then almost caught again in a department store and Sydney set stuff on fire and then they get on a senior citizen tour bus and are almost caught again when the bus stops, but thanks to Adrian’s compulsion, they escape. They finally manage to make it to The Witching Hour, the Moroi casino, where Sydney makes herself invisible and convinces Adrian to make a scene when the Alchemists that are following them make their move. He makes sure everyone knows he's Lord Adrian Ivashkov and the Moroi take care of him and send the Alchemists away. Seems the Moroi will do anything for one of their own, which is similar to what Lissa said when she said she couldn't help Adrian find the Alchemist facility where Sydney was being held. That gives Adrian an idea! He gets down on one knee and proposes to Sydney. This is of course not how Sydney ever expected her life would go, but she never wants to be with anyone but Adrian, so she accepts.
Sydney and Adrian get a marriage license and go to an all-in-one chapel with everything they'll both need: dresses, tuxes, hair, makeup, the works. Adrian tells Sydney to get ready and to spare no expense while he goes off to a pawn shop and uses Aunt Tatiana's ruby cufflinks to make and pay for wedding bands. He also makes some calls. They get married and then set off for a hotel, but not to stay the night. To catch a ride on Jill's wedding gift, a helicopter that will take them back to Court. When they get to the helipad, their ride is waiting, but they're unable to land because Sheridan and a few other Alchemists are there waiting. For fuck's sake! Sydney makes a huge ring of fire and threatens to kill the extra Alchemists while Sheridan holds Adrian at gunpoint. Of course they manage to get away, finally, but sheesh at the lengths the Alchemists will go to stop Sydney. It's a little bit much.
Mr. and Mrs. Ivashkov finally get to Court and immediately go to Queen Lissa. Surprisingly, Jared and Zoe Sage are there, plus Ian, that guy who had a crush on Sydney and who now apparently is into Zoe, and also Adrian's parents, plus Rose and Dimitri. The Alchemists and Nathan Ivashkov are adamant that the wedding was a sham and that they need to turn Sydney over to the Alchemists for punishment. After a bit of pleading with the Queen, she declines the Alchemists' request and offers Sydney sanctuary. And also puts Nathan Ivashkov in his place. Daniela stands up for her son and leaves her sham marriage. Adrian, Sydney and Daniela go off to guest housing until things can get sorted out. Awkward as it is, Sydney and Adrian enjoy their first night together as husband and wife. Aww!
The next day, however, everything is a shit show again. Just when you think all they'll have to do now is figure out how to live forever on the run from the Alchemists, something even more terrible happens. Rose and Dimitri show up with horrible news. Jill is missing, and the vote to secure Lissa's place as Queen without a family hasn't yet passed. If anyone finds out what happened, it will be chaos. But what happened to Jill? Everyone got back to Amberwood just fine and Angeline and Jill were safely in their room, but when Angeline woke up the next morning, Jill was nowhere to be found. She disappeared… like magic.