The Empyrean series Tome 1 (Broché)

Welcome to the brutal and elite world of Basgiath War College, where everyone has an agenda, and every night could be your last. Twenty-year-old Violet Sorrengail was supposed to live a quiet life among books and history. Now, the commanding general-also known as her tough-as-talons mother-has ordered her to join the hundreds of candidates striving to become the elite of Navarre: dragon riders. But when you''re smaller than everyone else, death is only a heartbeat away...because dragons don''t bond to "fragile" humans.
They incinerate them. With fewer dragons willing to bond than cadets, most would kill Violet to better their own chances of success. The rest would kill her just for being her mother''s daughter-like Xaden Riorson, the most powerful and ruthless wingleader. Alliances will be forged. Lives will be lost. Traitors will become allies...or even lovers. But sleep with one eye open, because once you enter, there are only two ways out: graduate or die.