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look up at me tied here. Tell them I’ll open my eyes and look back at them, and they’ll know that I survived.” The three bridgemen fell silent. “Yes, of course, Kaladin,” Teft said. “We’ll do it.” “Tell them,” Kaladin continued, voice firmer, “that it won’t end here. Tell them I chose not to take my own life, and so there’s no way in Damnation I’m going to give it up to Sadeas.” Rock smiled one of those broad smiles of his. “By the uli’tekanaki, Kaladin. I almost believe you’ll do it.” “Here,” Teft said, handing him something. “For luck.” Kaladin took the object in a weak, bloodstained hand. It was a sphere, a full skymark. It was dun, the Stormlight gone from it. Carry a sphere with you into the storm, the old saying said, and at least you’ll have light by which to see. “It’s all we were able to save from your pouch,” Teft said. “Gaz and Lamaril got the rest. We complained, but what were we to do?” “Thank you,” Kaladin said. Moash and Rock retreated to the safety of the barrack, Syl leaving Rock’s shoulder to stay with Kaladin. Teft lingered too, as if thinking to spend the storm with Kaladin. He eventually shook his head, muttering, and joined the others. Kaladin thought he heard the man calling himself a coward. The door to the barrack shut. Kaladin fingered the smooth glass sphere. The sky was darkening, and not just because the sun was setting. Blackness gathered. The highstorm. Syl walked up the side of the wall, then sat down on it, looking at him, tiny face somber. “You told them you’d survive. What happens if you don’t?” Kaladin’s head was pounding with his pulse. “My mother would cringe if she knew how quickly the other soldiers taught me to gamble. First night in Amaram’s army, and they had me playing for spheres.” “Kaladin?” Syl said. “Sorry,” Kaladin said, rocking his head from side to side. “What you said, it reminded me of that night. There’s a term in gambling, you see. ‘In for all,’ they say. It’s when you put all of your money on one bet.” “I don’t understand.” “I’m putting it all on the long bet,” Kaladin whispered. “If I die, then they’ll come out, shake their heads, and tell themselves they knew it would happen. But if I live, they’ll remember it. And it will give them hope. They might see it as a miracle.” Syl was silent for a moment. “Do you want to be a miracle?” “No,” Kaladin whispered. “But for them, I will be.” It was a desperate, foolish hope. The eastern horizon, inverted in his sight, was growing darker. From this perspective, the storm was like the shadow of some enormous beast lumbering across the ground. He felt the disturbing fuzziness of a person who had been hit too hard on the head. Concussion. That was what it was called. He was having trouble thinking, but he didn’t want to fall unconscious. He wanted to stare at the highstorm
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straight on, though it terrified him. He felt the same panic he’d felt looking down into the black chasm, back when he’d nearly killed himself. It was the fear of what he could not see, what he could not know. The stormwall approached, the visible curtain of rain and wind at the advent of a highstorm. It was a massive wave of water, dirt, and rocks, hundreds of feet high, thousands upon thousands of windspren zipping before it. In battle, he’d been able to fight his way to safety with the skill of his spear. When he’d stepped to the edge of the chasm, there had been a line of retreat. This time, there was nothing. No way to fight or avoid that black beast, that shadow spanning the entirety of the horizon, plunging the world into an early night. The eastern edge of the crater that made the warcamp had been worn away, and Bridge Four’s barrack was first in its row. There was nothing between him and the Plains. Nothing between him and the storm. Staring at that raging, blustering, churning wave of wind-pushed water and debris, Kaladin felt as if he were watching the end of the world descend upon him. He took a deep breath, the pain of his ribs forgotten, as the stormwall crossed the lumberyard in a flash and slammed into him. The force of the stormwall nearly knocked him unconscious, but the sudden chill of it shocked him lucid. For a moment, Kaladin couldn’t feel anything but that coldness. He was pressed against the side of the barrack by the extended blast of water. Rocks and bits of branch crashed against the stone around him; he was already too numb to tell how many slashed or beat against his skin. He bore it, dazed, eyes pressed shut and breath held. Then the stormwall passed, crashing onward. The next blast of wind came in from the side—the air was swirling and gusting from all directions now. The wind flung him sideways—his back scraping against stone—and up into the air. The wind stabilized, blowing out of the east again. Kaladin hung in darkness, and his feet yanked against the rope. In a panic, he realized that he was now flapping in the wind like a kite, tied to the ring in the barrack’s slanted roof. Only that rope kept him from being blown along with the other debris to be tumbled and tossed before the storm across the entirety of Roshar. For those few heartbeats, he could not think. He could only feel the panic and the cold—one boiling out of his chest, the other trying to freeze him from the skin inward. He screamed, clutching his single sphere as if it were a lifeline. The scream was a mistake, as it let that coldness course into his mouth. Like a spirit forcing its arm down his throat. The wind was like a maelstrom, chaotic, moving in different directions. One buff et ripped at him, then passed, and he fell to the roof of the barrack with
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a thud. Almost immediately, the terrible winds tried to lift him again, pounding his skin with waves of icy water. Thunder crashed, the heartbeat of the beast that had swallowed him. Lighting split the darkness like white teeth in the night. The wind was so loud it nearly drowned out the thunder; howling and moaning. “Grab the roof, Kaladin!” Syl’s voice. So soft, so small. How could he hear it at all? Numbly, he realized he was lying facedown on the sloped roof. It wasn’t so steeply peaked that he was immediately pitched off, and the wind was generally blowing him backward. He did as Syl said, grabbing the lip of the roof with cold, slick fingers. Then he lay facedown, head tucked between his arms. He still had the sphere in his hand, pressed against the stone rooftop. His fingers started to slip. The wind was blowing so hard, trying to push him to the west. If he let go, he’d end up dangling in the air again. His rope tether was not long enough for him to get to the other side of the shallow-peaked rooftop, where he’d be sheltered. A boulder hit the roof beside him—he couldn’t hear its impact or see it in the tempest’s darkness, but he could feel the building vibrate. The boulder rolled forward and crashed down to the ground. The entire storm didn’t have such force, but occasional gusts could pick up and toss large objects, hurling them hundreds of feet. His fingers slipped further. “The ring,” Syl whispered. The ring. The rope tied his legs to a steel ring on the side of the roof behind him. Kaladin let go, then snatched the ring as he was blown backward. He clutched to it. The rope continued down to his ankles, about the length of his body. He thought for a moment of untying the ropes, but he didn’t dare let go of the ring. He clung there, like a pennant flapping in the wind, holding the ring in both hands, sphere cupped inside one of them and pressed against the steel. Each moment was a struggle. The wind yanked him left, then hurled him right. He couldn’t know how long it lasted; time had no meaning in this place of fury and tumult. His numbed, battered mind started to think he was in a nightmare. A terrible dream inside his head, full of black, living winds. Screams in the air, bright and white, the flash of lightning revealing a terrible, twisted world of chaos and terror. The very buildings seemed blown sideways, the entire world askew, warped by the storm’s terrible power. In those brief moments of light when he dared to look, he thought he saw Syl standing in front of him, her face to the wind, tiny hands forward. As if she were trying to hold back the storm and split the winds as a stone divided the waters of a swift stream. The cold of the rainwater numbed the scrapes and bruises. But it also numbed his fingers. He didn’t
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feel them slipping. The next he knew, he was whipping in the air again, tossed to the side, being slammed down against the roof of the barrack. He hit hard. His vision flashed with sparkling lights that melded together and were followed by blackness. Not unconsciousness, blackness. Kaladin blinked. All was still. The storm was quiet, and everything was purely dark. I’m dead, he thought immediately. But why could he feel the wet stone roof beneath him? He shook his head, dripping rainwater down his face. There was no lightning, no wind, no rain. The silence was unnatural. He stumbled to his feet, managing to stand on the gently sloped roof. The stone was slick beneath his toes. He couldn’t feel his wounds. The pain just wasn’t there. He opened his mouth to call out into the darkness, but hesitated. That silence was not to be broken. The air itself seemed to weigh less, as did he. He almost felt as if he could float away. In that darkness, an enormous face appeared just in front of his. A face of blackness, yet faintly traced in the dark. It was wide, the breadth of a massive thunderhead, and extended far to either side, yet it was somehow still visible to Kaladin. Inhuman. Smiling. Kaladin felt a deep chill—a rolling prickle of ice—scurry down his spine and through his entire body. The sphere suddenly burst to life in his hand, flaring with a sapphire glow. It illuminated the stone roof beneath him, making his fist blaze with blue fire. His shirt was in tatters, his skin lacerated. He looked down at himself, shocked, then looked up at the face. It was gone. There was only the darkness. Lightning flashed, and Kaladin’s pains returned. He gasped, falling to his knees before the rain and the wind. He slipped down, face hitting the rooftop. What had that been? A vision? A delusion? His strength was fleeing him, his thoughts growing muddled again. The winds weren’t as strong now, but the rain was still so cold. Lethargic, confused, nearly overwhelmed by his pain, he brought his hand up to the side and looked at the sphere. It was glowing. Smeared with his blood and glowing. He hurt so much, and his strength had faded. Closing his eyes, he felt himself enveloped by a second blackness. The blackness of unconsciousness. Rock was the first to the door when the highstorm subsided. Teft followed more slowly, groaning to himself. His knees hurt. His knees always hurt near a storm. His grandfather had complained about that in his later years, and Teft had called him daft. Now he felt it too. Storming Damnation, he thought, wearily stepping outside. It was still raining, of course. These were the after-flurries of drizzle that trailed a highstorm, the riddens. A few rainspren sat in puddles, like blue candles, and a few windspren danced in the stormwinds. The rain was cold, and he splashed through puddles that soaked his sandaled feet, chilling them straight through the skin and muscle. He hated being wet.
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But, then, he hated a lot of things. For a while, life had been looking up. Not now. How did everything go so wrong so quickly? he thought, holding his arms close, walking slowly and watching his feet. Some soldiers had left their barracks and stood nearby, wearing raincloaks, watching. Probably to make certain nobody had snuck out to cut Kaladin down early. They didn’t try to stop Rock, though. The storm had passed. Rock charged around the side of the building. Other bridgemen left the barrack behind as Teft followed Rock. Storming Horneater. Like a big lumbering chull. He actually believed. He thought they’d find that foolish young bridgeleader alive. Probably figured they’d discover him having a nice cup of tea, relaxing in the shade with the Stormfather himself. And you don’t believe? Teft asked himself, still looking down. If you don’t, why are you following? But if you did believe, you’d look. You wouldn’t stare at your feet. You’d look up and see. Could a man both believe, and not believe, at the same time? Teft stopped beside Rock and—steeling himself—looked up at the wall of the barrack. There he saw what he’d expected and what he’d feared. The corpse looked like a hunk of slaughter house meat, skinned and bled. Was that a person? Kaladin’s skin was sliced in a hundred places, dribbles of blood mixing with rainwater running down the side of the building. The lad’s body still hung by the ankles. His shirt had been ripped off; his bridgeman trousers were ragged. Ironically, his face was cleaner now than when they’d left him, washed by the storm. Teft had seen enough dead men on the battlefield to know what he was looking at. Poor lad, he thought, shaking his head as the rest of Bridge Four gathered around him and Rock, quiet, horrified. You almost made me believe in you. Kaladin’s eyes snapped open. The gathered bridgemen gasped, several cursing and falling to the ground, splashing in the pools of rainwater. Kaladin drew in a ragged breath, wheezing, eyes staring forward, intense and unseeing. He exhaled, blowing flecks of bloody spittle out over his lips. His hand, hanging below him, slipped open. Something dropped to the stones. The sphere Teft had given him. It splashed into a puddle and stopped there. It was dun, no Stormlight in it. What in the name of Kelek? Teft thought, kneeling. You left a sphere out in the storm, and it gathered Stormlight. Held in Kaladin’s hand, this one should have been fully infused. What had gone wrong? “Umalakai’ki!” Rock bellowed, pointing. “Kama mohoray namavau—” He stopped, realizing he was speaking the wrong language. “Somebody be helping me get him down! Is still alive! We need ladder and knife! Hurry!” The bridgemen scrambled. The soldiers approached, muttering, but they didn’t stop the bridgemen. Sadeas himself had declared that the Stormfather would choose Kaladin’s fate. Everyone knew that meant death. Except…Teft stood up straight, holding the dun sphere. An empty sphere after a storm, he thought. And a man who’s still alive
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when he should be dead. Two impossibilities. Together they bespoke something that should be even more impossible. “Where’s that ladder!” Teft found himself yelling. “Curse you all, hurry, hurry! We need to get him bandaged. Somebody go fetch that salve he always puts on wounds!” He glanced back at Kaladin, then spoke much more softly. “And you’d better survive, son. Because I want some answers.” It was not uncommon for us to meet native peoples while traveling through the Unclaimed Hills, Shallan read. These ancient lands were once one of the Silver Kingdoms, after all. One must wonder if the great-shelled beasts lived among them back then, or if the creatures have come to inhabit the wilderness left by humankind’s passing. She settled back in her chair, the humid air warm around her. To her left, Jasnah Kholin floated quietly in the pool inset in the floor of the bathing chamber. Jasnah liked to soak in the bath, and Shallan couldn’t blame her. During most of Shallan’s life, bathing had been an ordeal involving dozens of parshmen carting heated buckets of water, followed by a quick scrub in the brass tub before the water cooled. Kharbranth’s palace offered far more luxury. The stone pool in the ground resembled a small personal lake, luxuriously warmed by clever fabrials that produced heat. Shallan didn’t know much about fabrials yet, though part of her was very intrigued. This type was becoming increasingly common. Just the other day, the Conclave staff had sent Jasnah one to heat her chambers. The water didn’t have to be carried in but came out of pipes. At the turn of a lever, water flowed in. It was warm when it entered, and was kept heated by the fabrials set into the sides of the pool. Shallan had bathed in the chamber herself, and it was absolutely marvelous. The practical decor was of rock decorated with small colorful stones set in mortar up the sides of the walls. Shallan sat beside the pool, fully dressed, reading as she waited on Jasnah’s needs. The book was Gavilar’s account—as spoken to Jasnah herself years ago—after his first meeting with the strange parshmen later known as the Parshendi. Occasionally, during our explorations, we’d meet with natives, she read. Not parshmen. Natan people, with their pale bluish skin, wide noses, and wool-like white hair. In exchange for gifts of food, they would point us to the hunting grounds of greatshells. Then we met the parshmen. I’d been on a half-dozen expeditions to Natanatan, but never had I seen anything like this! Parshmen, living on their own? All logic, experience, and science declared that to be an impossibility. Parshmen need the hand of civilized peoples to guide them. This has been proven time and time again. Leave one out in the wilderness, and it will just sit there, doing nothing, until someone comes along to give it orders. Yet here was a group who could hunt, make weapons, build buildings, and—indeed—create their own civilization. We soon realized that this single discovery could expand, perhaps overthrow, all
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we understood about our gentle servants. Shallan moved her eyes down to the bottom of the page where—separated by a line—the undertext was written in a small, cramped script. Most books dictated by men had an undertext, notes added by the woman or ardent who scribed the book. By unspoken agreement, the undertext was never shared out loud. Here, a wife would sometimes clarify—or even contradict—the account of her husband. The only way to preserve such honesty for future scholars was to maintain the sanctity and secrecy of the writing. It should be noted, Jasnah had written in the undertext to this passage, that I have adapted my father’s words—by his own instruction—to make them more appropriate for recording. That meant she made his dictation sound more scholarly and impressive. In addition, by most accounts, King Gavilar originally ignored these strange, self-sufficient parshmen. It was only after explanation by his scholars and scribes that he understood the import of what he’d discovered. This inclusion is not meant to highlight my father’s ignorance; he was, and is, a warrior. His attention was not on the anthropological import of our expedition, but upon the hunt that was to be its culmination. Shallan closed the cover, thoughtful. The volume was from Jasnah’s own collection—the Palanaeum had several copies, but Shallan wasn’t allowed to bring the Palanaeum’s books into a bathing chamber. Jasnah’s clothing lay on a bench at the side of the room. Atop the folded garments, a small golden pouch held the Soulcaster. Shallan glanced at Jasnah. The princess floated face-up in the pool, black hair fanning out behind her in the water, her eyes closed. Her daily bath was the one time she seemed to relax completely. She looked much younger now, stripped of both clothing and intensity, floating like a child resting after a day of active swimming. Thirty-four years old. That seemed ancient in some regards—some women Jasnah’s age had children as old as Shallan. And yet it was also young. Young enough that Jasnah was praised for her beauty, young enough that men declared it a shame she wasn’t yet married. Shallan glanced at the pile of clothing. She carried the broken fabrial in her safepouch. She could swap them here and now. It was the opportunity she’d been waiting for. Jasnah now trusted her enough to relax, soaking in the bathing chamber without worrying about her fabrial. Could Shallan really do it? Could she betray this woman who had taken her in? Considering what I’ve done before, she thought, this is nothing. It wouldn’t be the first time she betrayed someone who trusted her. She stood up. To the side, Jasnah cracked an eye. Blast, Shallan thought, tucking the book under her arm, pacing, trying to look thoughtful. Jasnah watched her. Not suspiciously. Curiously. “Why did your father want to make a treaty with the Parshendi?” Shallan found herself asking as she walked. “Why wouldn’t he want to?” “That’s not an answer.” “Of course it is. It’s just not one that tells you anything.” “It would help, Brightness, if
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you would give me a useful answer.” “Then ask a useful question.” Shallan set her jaw. “What did the Parshendi have that King Gavilar wanted?” Jasnah smiled, closing her eyes again. “Closer. But you can probably guess the answer to that.” “Shards.” Jasnah nodded, still relaxed in the water. “The text doesn’t mention them,” Shallan said. “My father didn’t speak of them,” Jasnah said. “But from things he said…well, I now suspect that they motivated the treaty.” “Can you be sure he knew, though? Maybe he just wanted the gemhearts.” “Perhaps,” Jasnah said. “The Parshendi seemed amused at our interest in the gemstones woven into their beards.” She smiled. “You should have seen our shock when we discovered where they’d gotten them. When the lanceryn died off during the scouring of Aimia, we thought we’d seen the last gemhearts of large size. And yet here was another great-shelled beast with them, living in a land not too distant from Kholinar itself. “Anyway, the Parshendi were willing to share them with us, so long as they could still hunt them too. To them, if you took the trouble to hunt the chasmfiends, their gemhearts were yours. I doubt a treaty would have been needed for that. And yet, just before leaving to return to Alethkar, my father suddenly began talking fervently of the need for an agreement.” “So what happened? What changed?” “I can’t be certain. However, he once described the strange actions of a Parshendi warrior during a chasmfiend hunt. Instead of reaching for his spear when the greatshell appeared, this man held his hand to the side in a very suspicious way. Only my father saw it; I suspected he believed the man planned to summon a Blade. The Parshendi realized what he was doing, and stopped himself. My father didn’t speak of it further, and I assume he didn’t want the world’s eyes on the Shattered Plains any more than they already were.” Shallan tapped her book. “It seems tenuous. If he was sure about the Blades, he must have seen more.” “I suspect so as well. But I studied the treaty carefully, after his death. The clauses for favored trade status and mutual border crossing could very well have been a step toward folding the Parshendi into Alethkar as a nation. It certainly would have prevented the Parshendi from trading their Shards to other kingdoms without coming to us first. Perhaps that was all he wanted to do.” “But why kill him?” Shallan said, arms crossed, strolling in the direction of Jasnah’s folded clothing. “Did the Parshendi realize that he intended to have their Shardblades, and so struck at him preemptively?” “Uncertain,” Jasnah said. She sounded skeptical. Why did she think the Parshendi killed Gavilar? Shallan nearly asked, but she had a feeling she wouldn’t get any more out of Jasnah. The woman expected Shallan to think, discover, and draw conclusions on her own. Shallan stopped beside the bench. The pouch holding the Soulcaster was open, the drawstrings loose. She could see the precious artifact curled up inside. The
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swap would be easy. She had used a large chunk of her money to buy gemstones that matched Jasnah’s, and had put them into the broken Soulcaster. The two were now exactly identical. She still hadn’t learned anything about using the fabrial; she’d tried to find a way to ask, but Jasnah avoided speaking of the Soulcaster. Pushing harder would be suspicious. Shallan would have to get information elsewhere. Perhaps from Kabsal, or maybe from a book in the Palanaeum. Regardless, the time was upon her. Shallan found her hand going to her safepouch, and she felt inside of it, running her fingers along the chains of her broken fabrial. Her heart beat faster. She glanced at Jasnah, but the woman was just lying there, floating, eyes closed. What if she opened her eyes? Don’t think of that! Shallan told herself. Just do it. Make the swap. It’s so close…. “You are progressing more quickly than I had assumed you would,” Jasnah said suddenly. Shallan spun, but Jasnah’s eyes were still closed. “I was wrong to judge you so harshly because of your prior education. I myself have often said that passion outperforms upbringing. You have the determination and the capacity to become a respected scholar, Shallan. I realize that the answers seem slow in coming, but continue your research. You will have them eventually.” Shallan stood for a moment, hand in her pouch, heart thumping uncontrollably. She felt sick. I can’t do it, she realized. Stormfather, but I’m a fool. I came all of this way…and now I can’t do it! She pulled her hand from her pouch and stalked back across the bathing chamber to her chair. What was she going to tell her brothers? Had she just doomed her family? She sat down, setting her book aside and sighing, prompting Jasnah to open her eyes. Jasnah watched her, then righted herself in the water and gestured for the hairsoap. Gritting her teeth, Shallan stood up and fetched the soap tray for Jasnah, bringing it over and squatting down to proffer it. Jasnah took the powdery hairsoap and mashed it in her hand, lathering it before putting it into her sleek black hair with both hands. Even naked, Jasnah Kholin was composed and in control. “Perhaps we have spent too much time indoors of late,” the princess said. “You look penned up, Shallan. Anxious.” “I’m fine,” Shallan said brusquely. “Hum, yes. As evidenced by your perfectly reasonable, relaxed tone. Perhaps we need to shift some of your training from history to something more hands-on, more visceral.” “Like natural science?” Shallan asked, perking up. Jasnah tilted her head back. Shallan knelt down on a towel beside the pool, then reached down with her freehand, massaging the soap into her mistress’s lush tresses. “I was thinking philosophy,” Jasnah said. Shallan blinked. “Philosophy? What good is that?” Isn’t it the art of saying nothing with as many words as possible? “Philosophy is an important field of study,” Jasnah said sternly. “Particularly if you’re going to be involved in court politics. The nature of
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morality must be considered, and preferably before one is exposed to situations where a moral decision is required.” “Yes, Brightness. Though I fail to see how philosophy is more ‘hands-on’ than history.” “History, by definition, cannot be experienced directly. As it is happening, it is the present, and that is philosophy’s realm.” “That’s just a matter of definition.” “Yes,” Jasnah said, “all words have a tendency to be subject to how they are defined.” “I suppose,” Shallan said, leaning back, letting Jasnah dunk her hair to clean off the soap. The princess began scrubbing her skin with mildly abrasive soap. “That was a particularly bland response, Shallan. What happened to your wit?” Shallan glanced at the bench and its precious fabrial. After all this time, she had proven too weak to do what needed to be done. “My wit is on temporary hiatus, Brightness,” she said. “Pending review by its colleagues, sincerity and temerity.” Jasnah raised an eyebrow at her. Shallan sat back on her heels, still kneeling on the towel. “How do you know what is right, Jasnah? If you don’t listen to the devotaries, how do you decide?” “That depends upon one’s philosophy. What is most important to you?” “I don’t know. Can’t you tell me?” “No,” Jasnah replied. “If I gave you the answers, I’d be no better than the devotaries, prescribing beliefs.” “They aren’t evil, Jasnah.” “Except when they try to rule the world.” Shallan drew her lips into a thin line. The War of Loss had destroyed the Hierocracy, shattering Vorinism into the devotaries. That was the inevitable result of a religion trying to rule. The devotaries were to teach morals, not enforce them. Enforcement was for the lighteyes. “You say you can’t give me answers,” Shallan said. “But can’t I ask for the advice of someone wise? Someone who’s gone before? Why write our philosophies, draw our conclusions, if not to influence others? You yourself told me that information is worthless unless we use it to make judgments.” Jasnah smiled, dunking her arms and washing off the soap. Shallan caught a victorious glimmer in her eye. She wasn’t necessarily advocating ideas because she believed them; she just wanted to push Shallan. It was infuriating. How was Shallan to know what Jasnah really thought if she adopted conflicting points of view like this? “You act as if there were one answer,” Jasnah said, gesturing to Shallan to fetch a towel and climbing from the pool. “A single, eternally perfect response.” Shallan hastily complied, bearing a large, fluffy towel. “Isn’t that what philosophy is about? Finding the answers? Seeking the truth, the real meaning of things?” Toweling off, Jasnah raised an eyebrow at her. “What?” Shallan asked, suddenly self-conscious. “I believe it is time for a field exercise,” Jasnah said. “Outside of the Palanaeum.” “Now?” Shallan asked. “It’s so late!” “I told you philosophy was a hands-on art,” Jasnah said, wrapping the towel around herself, then reaching down and taking the Soulcaster out of its pouch. She slipped the chains around her fingers, securing the gemstones to the
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back of her hand. “I’ll prove it to you. Come, help me dress.” As a child, Shallan had relished those evenings when she’d been able to slip away into the gardens. When the blanket of darkness rested atop the grounds, they had seemed a different place entirely. In those shadows, she’d been able to imagine that the rockbuds, shalebark, and trees were some foreign fauna. The scrapings of cremlings climbing out of cracks had become the footsteps of mysterious people from far-off lands. Large-eyed traders from Shinovar, a greatshell rider from Kadrix, or a narrowboat sailor from the Purelake. She didn’t have those same imaginings when walking Kharbranth at night. Imagining dark wanderers in the night had once been an intriguing game—but here, dark wanderers were likely to be real. Instead of becoming a mysterious, intriguing place at night, Kharbranth seemed much the same to her—just more dangerous. Jasnah ignored the calls of rickshaw pullers and palanquin porters. She walked slowly in a beautiful dress of violet and gold, Shallan following in blue silk. Jasnah hadn’t taken time to have her hair done following her bath, and she wore it loose, cascading across her shoulders, almost scandalous in its freedom. They walked the Ralinsa—the main thoroughfare that led down the hillside in switchbacks, connecting Conclave and port. Despite the late hour, the roadway was crowded, and many of the men who walked here seemed to bear the night inside of them. They were gruff er, more shadowed of face. Shouts still rang through the city, but those carried the night in them too, measured by the roughness of their words and the sharpness of their tones. The steep, slanted hillside that formed the city was no less crowded with buildings than always, yet these too seemed to draw in the night. Blackened, like stones burned by a fire. Hollow remains. The bells still rang. In the darkness, each ring was a tiny scream. They made the wind more present, a living thing that caused a chiming cacophony each time it passed. A breeze rose, and an avalanche of sound came tumbling across the Ralinsa. Shallan nearly found herself ducking before it. “Brightness,” Shallan said. “Shouldn’t we call for a palanquin?” “A palanquin might inhibit the lesson.” “I’ll be all right learning that lesson during the day, if you wouldn’t mind.” Jasnah stopped, looking off the Ralinsa and toward a darker side street. “What do you think of that roadway, Shallan?” “It doesn’t look particularly appealing to me.” “And yet,” Jasnah said, “it is the most direct route from the Ralinsa to the theater district.” “Is that where we’re going?” “We aren’t ‘going’ anywhere,” Jasnah said, taking off down the side street. “We are acting, pondering, and learning.” Shallan followed nervously. The night swallowed them; only the occasional light from late-night taverns and shops offered illumination. Jasnah wore her black, fingerless glove over her Soulcaster, hiding the light of its gemstones. Shallan found herself creeping. Her slippered feet could feel every change in the ground underfoot, each pebble and crack. She looked about
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nervously as they passed a group of workers gathered around a tavern doorway. They were darkeyes, of course. In the night, that distinction seemed more profound. “Brightness?” Shallan asked in a hushed tone. “When we are young,” Jasnah said, “we want simple answers. There is no greater indication of youth, perhaps, than the desire for everything to be as it should. As it has ever been.” Shallan frowned, still watching the men by the tavern over her shoulder. “The older we grow,” Jasnah said, “the more we question. We begin to ask why. And yet, we still want the answers to be simple. We assume that the people around us—adults, leaders—will have those answers. Whatever they give often satisfies us.” “I was never satisfied,” Shallan said softly. “I wanted more.” “You were mature,” Jasnah said. “What you describe happens to most of us, as we age. Indeed, it seems to me that aging, wisdom, and wondering are synonymous. The older we grow, the more likely we are to reject the simple answers. Unless someone gets in our way and demands they be accepted regardless.” Jasnah’s eyes narrowed. “You wonder why I reject the devotaries.” “I do.” “Most of them seek to stop the questions.” Jasnah halted. Then she briefly pulled back her glove, using the light beneath to reveal the street around her. The gemstones on her hand—larger than broams—blazed like torches, red, white, and grey. “Is it wise to be showing your wealth like that, Brightness?” Shallan said, speaking very softly and glancing about her. “No,” Jasnah said. “It is most certainly not. Particularly not here. You see, this street has gained a particular reputation lately. On three separate occasions during the last two months, theatergoers who chose this route to the main road were accosted by footpads. In each case, the people were murdered.” Shallan felt herself grow pale. “The city watch,” Jasnah said, “has done nothing. Taravangian has sent them several pointed reprimands, but the captain of the watch is cousin to a very influential lighteyes in the city, and Taravangian is not a terribly powerful king. Some suspect that there is more going on, that the footpads might be bribing the watch. The politics of it are irrelevant at the moment for, as you can see, no members of the watch are guarding the place, despite its reputation.” Jasnah pulled her glove back on, plunging the roadway back into darkness. Shallan blinked, her eyes adjusting. “How foolish,” Jasnah said, “would you say it is for us to come here, two undefended women wearing costly clothing and bearing riches?” “Very foolish. Jasnah, can we go? Please. Whatever lesson you have in mind isn’t worth this.” Jasnah drew her lips into a line, then looked toward a narrow, darker alleyway off the road they were on. It was almost completely black now that Jasnah had replaced her glove. “You’re at an interesting place in your life, Shallan,” Jasnah said, flexing her hand. “You are old enough to wonder, to ask, to reject what is presented to you simply because it
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was presented to you. But you also cling to the idealism of youth. You feel there must be some single, all-defining Truth—and you think that once you find it, all that once confused you will suddenly make sense.” “I…” Shallan wanted to argue, but Jasnah’s words were tellingly accurate. The terrible things Shallan had done, the terrible thing she had planned to do, haunted her. Was it possible to do something horrible in the name of accomplishing something wonderful? Jasnah walked into the narrow alleyway. “Jasnah!” Shallan said. “What are you doing?” “This is philosophy in action, child,” Jasnah said. “Come with me.” Shallan hesitated at the mouth of the alleyway, her heart thumping, her thoughts muddled. The wind blew and bells rang, like frozen raindrops shattering against the stones. In a moment of decision, she rushed after Jasnah, preferring company, even in the dark, to being alone. The shrouded glimmer of the Soulcaster was barely enough to light their way, and Shallan followed in Jasnah’s shadow. Noise from behind. Shallan turned with a start to see several dark forms crowding into the alley. “Oh, Stormfather,” she whispered. Why? Why was Jasnah doing this? Shaking, Shallan grabbed at Jasnah’s dress with her freehand. Other shadows were moving in front of them, from the far side of the alley. They grew closer, grunting, splashing through foul, stagnant puddles. Chill water had already soaked Shallan’s slippers. Jasnah stopped moving. The frail light of her cloaked Soulcaster reflected off metal in the hands of their stalkers. Swords or knives. These men meant murder. You didn’t rob women like Shallan and Jasnah, women with powerful connections, then leave them alive as witnesses. Men like these were not the gentlemen bandits of romantic stories. They lived each day knowing that if they were caught, they would be hanged. Paralyzed by fear, Shallan couldn’t even scream. Stormfather, Stormfather, Stormfather! “And now,” Jasnah said, voice hard and grim, “the lesson.” She whipped off her glove. The sudden light was nearly blinding. Shallan raised a hand against it, stumbling back against the alley wall. There were four men around them. Not the men from the tavern entrance, but others. Men she hadn’t noticed watching them. She could see the knives now, and she could also see the murder in their eyes. Her scream finally broke free. The men grunted at the glare, but shoved their way forward. A thick-chested man with a dark beard came up to Jasnah, weapon raised. She calmly reached her hand out—fingers splayed—and pressed it against his chest as he swung a knife. Shallan’s breath caught in her throat. Jasnah’s hand sank into the man’s skin, and he froze. A second later he burned. No, he became fire. Transformed into flames in an eyeblink. Rising around Jasnah’s hand, they formed the outline of a man with head thrown back and mouth open. For just a moment, the blaze of the man’s death outshone Jasnah’s gemstones. Shallan’s scream trailed off. The figure of flames was strangely beautiful. It was gone in a moment, the fire dissipating into
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the night air, leaving an orange afterimage in Shallan’s eyes. The other three men began to curse, scrambling away, tripping over one another in their panic. One fell. Jasnah turned casually, brushing his shoulder with her fingers as he struggled to his knees. He became crystal, a figure of pure, flawless quartz—his clothing transformed along with him. The diamond in Jasnah’s Soulcaster faded, but there was still plenty of Stormlight left to send rainbow sparkles through the transformed corpse. The other two men fled in opposite directions. Jasnah took a deep breath, closing her eyes, lifting her hand above her head. Shallan held her safehand to her breast, stunned, confused. Terrified. Stormlight shot from Jasnah’s hand like twin bolts of lightning, symmetrical. One struck each of the footpads and they popped, puffing into smoke. Their empty clothing dropped to the ground. With a sharp snap, the smokestone crystal on Jasnah’s Soulcaster cracked, its light vanishing, leaving her with just the diamond and the ruby. The remains of the two footpads rose into the air, small billows of greasy vapor. Jasnah opened her eyes, looking eerily calm. She tugged her glove back on—using her safehand to hold it against her stomach and sliding her freehand fingers in. Then she calmly walked back the way they had come. She left the crystal corpse kneeling with hand upraised. Frozen forever. Shallan pried herself off the wall and hastened after Jasnah, sickened and amazed. Ardents were forbidden to use their Soulcasters on people. They rarely even used them in front of others. And how had Jasnah struck down two men at a distance? From everything Shallan had read—what little there was to find—Soulcasting required physical contact. Too overwhelmed to demand answers, she stood silent—freehand held to the side of her head, trying to control her trembling and her gasping breaths—as Jasnah called for a palanquin. One came eventually, and the two women climbed in. The bearers carried them toward the Ralinsa, their steps jostling Shallan and Jasnah, who sat across from one another in the palanquin. Jasnah idly popped the broken smokestone from her Soulcaster, then tucked it into a pocket. It could be sold to a gemsmith, who could cut smaller gemstones from the salvaged pieces. “That was horrible,” Shallan finally said, hand still held to her breast. “It was one of the most awful things I’ve ever experienced. You killed four men.” “Four men who were planning to beat, rob, kill, and possibly rape us.” “You tempted them into coming for us!” “Did I force them to commit any crimes?” “You showed off your gemstones.” “Can a woman not walk with her possessions down the street of a city?” “At night?” Shallan asked. “Through a rough area? Displaying wealth? You all but asked for what happened!” “Does that make it right?” Jasnah said, leaning forward. “Do you condone what the men were planning to do?” “Of course not. But that doesn’t make what you did right either!” “And yet, those men are off the street. The people of this city are that much safer.
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The issue that Taravangian has been so worried about has been solved, and no more theatergoers will fall to those thugs. How many lives did I just save?” “I know how many you just took,” Shallan said. “And through the power of something that should be holy!” “Philosophy in action. An important lesson for you.” “You did all this just to prove a point,” Shallan said softly. “You did this to prove to me that you could. Damnation, Jasnah, how could you do something like that?” Jasnah didn’t reply. Shallan stared at the woman, searching for emotion in those expressionless eyes. Stormfather. Did I ever really know this woman? Who is she, really? Jasnah leaned back, watching the city pass. “I did not do this just to prove a point, child. I have been feeling for some time that I took advantage of His Majesty’s hospitality. He doesn’t realize how much trouble he could face for allying himself with me. Besides, men like those…” There was something in her voice, an edge Shallan had never heard before. What was done to you? Shallan wondered with horror. And who did it? “Regardless,” Jasnah continued, “tonight’s actions came about because I chose this path, not because of anything I felt you needed to see. However, the opportunity also presented a chance for instruction, for questions. Am I a monster or am I a hero? Did I just slaughter four men, or did I stop four murderers from walking the streets? Does one deserve to have evil done to her by consequence of putting herself where evil can reach her? Did I have a right to defend myself? Or was I just looking for an excuse to end lives?” “I don’t know,” Shallan whispered. “You will spend the next week researching it and thinking on it. If you wish to be a scholar—a true scholar who changes the world—then you will need to face questions like this. There will be times when you must make decisions that churn your stomach, Shallan Davar. I’ll have you ready to make those decisions.” Jasnah fell silent, looking out the side as the palanquin bearers marched them up to the Conclave. Too troubled to say more, Shallan suffered the rest of the trip in silence. She followed Jasnah through the hushed hallways to their rooms, passing scholars on their way to the Palanaeum for some midnight study. Inside their rooms, Shallan helped Jasnah undress, though she hated touching the woman. She shouldn’t have felt that way. The men Jasnah had killed were terrible creatures, and she had little doubt that they would have killed her. But it wasn’t the act itself so much as the cold callousness of it that bothered her. Still feeling numb, Shallan fetched Jasnah a sleeping robe as the woman removed her jewelry and set it on the dressing table. “You could have let the other three get away,” Shallan said, walking back toward Jasnah, who had sat down to brush her hair. “You only needed to kill one of them.” “No, I didn’t,” Jasnah
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said. “Why? They would have been too frightened to do something like that again.” “You don’t know that. I sincerely wanted those men gone. A careless barmaid walking home the wrong way cannot protect herself, but I can. And I will.” “You have no authority to do so, not in someone else’s city.” “True,” Jasnah said. “Another point to consider, I suppose.” She raised the brush to her hair, pointedly turning away from Shallan. She closed her eyes, as if to shut Shallan out. The Soulcaster sat on the dressing table beside Jasnah’s earrings. Shallan gritted her teeth, holding the soft, silken robe. Jasnah sat in her white underdress, brushing her hair. There will be times when you must make decisions that churn your stomach, Shallan Davar…. I’ve faced them already. I’m facing one now. How dare Jasnah do this? How dare she make Shallan a part of it? How dare she use something beautiful and holy as a device for destruction? Jasnah didn’t deserve to own the Soulcaster. With a swift move of her hand, Shallan tucked the folded robe under her safearm, then shoved her hand into her safepouch and popped out the intact smokestone from her father’s Soulcaster. She stepped up to the dressing table, and—using the motion of placing the robe onto the table as a cover—made the exchange. She slid the working Soulcaster into her safehand within its sleeve, stepping back as Jasnah opened her eyes and glanced at the robe, which now sat innocently beside the nonfunctional Soulcaster. Shallan’s breath caught in her throat. Jasnah closed her eyes again, handing the brush toward Shallan. “Fifty strokes tonight, Shallan. It has been a fatiguing day.” Shallan moved by rote, brushing her mistress’s hair while clutching the stolen Soulcaster in her hidden safehand, panicked that Jasnah would notice the swap at any moment. She didn’t. Not when she put on her robe. Not when she tucked the broken Soulcaster away in her jewelry case and locked it with a key she wore around her neck as she slept. Shallan walked from the room stunned, in turmoil. Exhausted, sickened, confused. But undiscovered. FIVE AND A HALF YEARS AGO “Kaladin, look at this rock,” Tien said. “It changes colors when you look at it from different sides.” Kal looked away from the window, glancing at his brother. Now thirteen years of age, Tien had turned from an eager boy into an eager adolescent. Though he’d grown, he was still small for his age, and his mop of black and brown hair still refused all attempts at order. He was squatting beside the lacquered cobwood dinner table, eyes level with the glossy surface, looking at a small, lumpish rock. Kal sat on a stool peeling longroots with a short knife. The brown roots were dirty on the outside and sticky when he sliced into them, so working on them coated his fingers with a thick layer of crem. He finished a root and handed it up to his mother, who washed it off and sliced it into the stew pot. “Mother,
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look at this,” Tien said. Late-afternoon sunlight streamed through the leeside window, bathing the table. “From this side, the rock sparkles red, but from the other side, it’s green.” “Perhaps it’s magical,” Hesina said. Chunk after chunk of longroot plunked into the water, each splash with a slightly different note. “I think it must be,” Tien said. “Or it has a spren. Do spren live in rocks?” “Spren live in everything,” Hesina replied. “They can’t live in everything,” Kal said, dropping a peel into the pail at his feet. He glanced out the window, watching the road that led from the town to the citylord’s mansion. “They do,” Hesina said. “Spren appear when something changes—when fear appears, or when it begins to rain. They are the heart of change, and therefore the heart of all things.” “This longroot,” Kal said, holding it up skeptically. “Has a spren.” “And if you slice it up?” “Each bit has a spren. Only smaller.” Kal frowned, looking over the long tuber. They grew in cracks in the stone where water collected. They tasted faintly of minerals, but were easy to grow. His family needed food that didn’t cost much, these days. “So we eat spren,” Kal said flatly. “No,” she said, “we eat the roots.” “When we have to,” Tien added with a grimace. “And the spren?” Kal pressed. “They are freed. To return to wherever it is that spren live.” “Do I have a spren?” Tien said, looking down at his chest. “You have a soul, dear. You’re a person. But the pieces of your body may very well have spren living in them. Very small ones.” Tien pinched at his skin, as if trying to pry the tiny spren out. “Dung,” Kal said suddenly. “Kal!” Hesina snapped. “That’s not talk for mealtime.” “Dung,” Kal said stubbornly. “It has spren?” “I suppose it does.” “Dungspren,” Tien said, then snickered. His mother continued to chop. “Why all of these questions, suddenly?” Kal shrugged. “I just—I don’t know. Because.” He’d been thinking recently about the way the world worked, about what he was to do with his place in it. The other boys his age, they didn’t wonder about their place. Most knew what their future held. Working in the fields. Kal had a choice, though. Over the last several months, he’d finally made that choice. He would become a soldier. He was fifteen now, and could volunteer when the next recruiter came through town. He planned to do just that. No more wavering. He would learn to fight. That was the end of it. Wasn’t it? “I want to understand,” he said. “I just want everything to make sense.” His mother smiled at that, standing in her brown work dress, hair pulled back in a tail, the top hidden beneath her yellow kerchief. “What?” he demanded. “Why are you smiling?” “You just want everything to make sense?” “Yes.” “Well next time the ardents come through the town to burn prayers and Elevate people’s Callings, I’ll pass the message along.” She smiled. “Until then, keep peeling roots.”
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Kal sighed, but did as she told him. He checked out the window again, and nearly dropped the root in shock. The carriage. It was coming down the roadway from the mansion. He felt a flutter of nervous hesitation. He’d planned, he’d thought, but now that the time was upon him, he wanted to sit and keep peeling. There would be another opportunity, surely…. No. He stood, trying to keep the anxiety from his voice. “I’m going to go rinse off.” He held up crem-covered fingers. “You should have washed the roots off first as I told you,” his mother noted. “I know,” Kal said. Did his sigh of regret sound fake? “Maybe I’ll just wash them all off now.” Hesina said nothing as he gathered up the remaining roots, crossed to the door, heart thumping, and stepped out into the evening light. “See,” Tien said from behind, “from this side it’s green. I don’t think it’s a spren, Mother. It’s the light. It makes the rock change….” The door swung closed. Kal set down the tubers and charged through the streets of Hearthstone, passing men chopping wood, women throwing out dishwater, and a group of grandfathers sitting on steps and looking at the sunset. He dunked his hands into a rain barrel, but didn’t stop as he shook the water free. He ran around Mabrow Pigherder’s house, up past the commonwater—the large hole cut into the rock at the center of the town to catch rain—and along the breakwall, the steep hillside against which the town was built to shield it from storms. Here, he found a small stand of stumpweight trees. Knobby and about as tall as a man, they grew leaves only on their leeward sides, running down the length of the tree like rungs on a ladder, waving in the cool breeze. As Kal got close, the large, bannerlike leaves snapped up close to the trunks, making a series of whipping sounds. Kal’s father stood on the other side, hands clasped behind his back. He was waiting where the road from the manor turned past Hearthstone. Lirin turned with a start, noticing Kal. He wore his finest clothing: a blue coat, buttoning up the sides, like a lighteyes’s coat. But it was over a pair of white trousers that showed wear. He studied Kal through his spectacles. “I’m going with you,” Kal blurted. “Up to the mansion.” “How did you know? “Everyone knows,” Kal said. “You think they wouldn’t talk if Brightlord Roshone invited you to dinner? You, of all people?” Lirin looked away. “I told your mother to keep you busy.” “She tried.” Kal grimaced. “I’ll probably hear a storm of it when she finds those longroots sitting outside the front door.” Lirin said nothing. The carriage rolled to a stop nearby, wheels grinding against the stone. “This will not be a pleasant, idle meal, Kal,” Lirin said. “I’m not a fool, Father.” When Hesina had been told there was no more need for her to work in the town…Well, there was a reason they’d been reduced
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to eating longroots. “If you’re going to confront him, then you should have someone to support you.” “And that someone is you?” “I’m pretty much all you have.” The coachman cleared his throat. He didn’t get down and open the door, the way he did for Brightlord Roshone. Lirin eyed Kal. “If you send me back, I’ll go,” Kal said. “No. Come along if you must.” Lirin walked up to the carriage and pulled open the door. It wasn’t the fancy, gold-trimmed vehicle that Roshone used. This was the second carriage, the older brown one. Kal climbed in, feeling a surge of excitement at the small victory—and an equal measure of panic. They were going to face Roshone. Finally. The benches inside were amazing, the red cloth covering them softer than anything Kal had ever felt. He sat down, and the seat was surprisingly springy. Lirin sat across from Kal, pulling the door closed, and the coachman snapped his whip at the horses. The vehicle turned around and rattled back up the road. As soft as the seat was, the ride was terribly bumpy, and it rattled Kal’s teeth against one another. It was worse than riding in a wagon, though that was probably because they were going faster. “Why didn’t you want us to know about this?” Kal asked. “I wasn’t certain I’d go.” “What else would you do?” “Move away,” Lirin said. “Take you to Kharbranth and escape this town, this kingdom, and Roshone’s petty grudges.” Kal blinked in shock. He’d never thought of that. Suddenly everything seemed to expand. His future changed, wrapping upon itself, folding into a new form entirely. Father, Mother, Tien…with him. “Really?” Lirin nodded absently. “Even if we didn’t go to Kharbranth, I’m sure many Alethi towns would welcome us. Most have never had a surgeon to care for them. They do the best they can with local men who learned most of what they know from superstition or working on the occasional wounded chull. We could even move to Kholinar; I’m skilled enough to get work as a physician’s assistant there.” “Why don’t we go, then? Why haven’t we gone?” Lirin watched out the window. “I don’t know. We should leave. It makes sense. We have the money. We aren’t wanted here. The citylord hates us, the people mistrust us, the Stormfather himself seems inclined to knock us down.” There was something in Lirin’s voice. Regret? “I tried very hard to leave once,” Lirin said, more softly. “But there’s a tie between a man’s home and his heart. I’ve cared for these people, Kal. Delivered their children, set their bones, healed their scrapes. You’ve seen the worst of them, these last few years, but there was a time before that, a good time.” He turned to Kal, clasping his hands in front of him, the carriage rattling. “They’re mine, son. And I’m theirs. They’re my responsibility, now that Wistiow has gone. I can’t leave them to Roshone.” “Even if they like what he’s doing?” “Particularly because of that.” Lirin raised a hand to his
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head. “Stormfather. It sounds more foolish now that I say it.” “No. I understand. I think.” Kal shrugged. “I guess, well, they still come to us when they’re hurt. They complain about how unnatural it is to cut into a person, but they still come. I used to wonder why.” “And did you come to a conclusion?” “Kind of. I decided that in the end, they’d rather be alive to curse at you a few more days. It’s what they do. Just like healing them is what you do. And they used to give you money. A man can say all kinds of things, but where he sets his spheres, that’s where his heart is.” Kal frowned. “I guess they did appreciate you.” Lirin smiled. “Wise words. I keep forgetting that you’re nearly a man, Kal. When did you go and grow up on me?” That night when we were nearly robbed, Kal thought immediately. That night when you shone light on the men outside, and showed that bravery had nothing to do with a spear held in battle. “You’re wrong about one thing, though,” Lirin said. “You told me that they did appreciate me. But they still do. Oh, they grumble—they’ve always done that. But they also leave food for us.” Kal started. “They do?” “How do you think we’ve been eating these last four months?” “But—” “They’re frightened of Roshone, so they’re quiet about it. They left it for your mother when she went to clean or put it in the rain barrel when it’s empty.” “They tried to rob us.” “And those very men were among the ones who gave us food as well.” Kal pondered that as the carriage arrived at the manor house. It had been a long time since he’d visited the large, two-story building. It was constructed with a standard roof that sloped toward the stormward side, but was much larger. The walls were of thick white stones, and it had majestic square pillars on the leeward side. Would he see Laral here? He was embarrassed by how infrequently he thought about her these days. The mansion’s front grounds had a low stone wall covered with all kinds of exotic plants. Rockbuds lined the top, their vines draping down the outside. Clusters of a bulbous variety of shalebark grew along the inside, bursting with a variety of bright colors. Oranges, reds, yellows, and blues. Some outcroppings looked like heaps of clothing, with folds spread like fans. Others grew out like horns. Most had tendrils like threads that waved in the wind. Brightlord Roshone paid much more attention to his grounds than Wistiow had. They walked up past the whitewashed pillars and entered between the thick wooden stormdoors. The vestibule inside had a low ceiling and was decorated with ceramics; zircon spheres gave them a pale blue cast. A tall servant in a long black coat and a bright purple cravat greeted them. He was Natir, the steward now that Miliv had died. He’d been brought in from Dalilak, a large coastal city to the north.
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Natir led them to a dining room where Roshone sat at a long darkwood table. He’d gained weight, though not enough to be called fat. He still had that grey-flecked beard, and his hair was greased back down to his collar. He wore white trousers and a tight red vest over a white shirt. He’d already begun his meal, and the spicy scents made Kal’s stomach rumble. How long had it been since he’d had pork? There were five different dipping sauces on the table, and Roshone’s wine was a deep, crystalline orange. He ate alone, no sign of Laral or his son. The servant gestured toward a side table set up in a room next to the dining hall. Kal’s father took one look at it, then walked to Roshone’s table and sat down. Roshone paused, skewer halfway to his lips, spicy brown sauce dripping to the table before him. “I’m of the second nahn,” Lirin said, “and I have a personal invitation to dine with you. Surely you follow the precepts of rank closely enough to give me a place at your table.” Roshone clenched his teeth, but did not object. Taking a deep breath, Kal sat down beside his father. Before he left to join the war on the Shattered Plains, he had to know. Was his father a coward or a man of courage? By the light of spheres at home, Lirin had always seemed weak. He worked in his surgery room, ignoring what the townspeople said about him. He told his son he couldn’t practice with the spear and forbade him to think of going to war. Weren’t those the actions of a coward? But five months ago, Kal had seen courage in him that he’d never expected. And in the calm blue light of Roshone’s palace, Lirin met the eyes of a man far above him in rank, wealth, and power. And did not flinch. How did he do it? Kal’s heart thumped uncontrollably. He had to put his hands in his lap to keep them from betraying his nervousness. Roshone waved to a serving man, and within a short time, new places had been set. The periphery of the room was dark. Roshone’s table was an illuminated island amid a vast black expanse. There were bowls of water for dipping one’s fingers and stiff white cloth napkins beside them. A lighteyes’ meal. Kal had rarely eaten such fine food; he tried not to make a fool of himself as he hesitantly took a skewer and imitated Roshone, using his knife to slide down the bottommost chunk of meat, then raising it and biting. The meat was savory and tender, though the spices were much hotter than he was accustomed to. Lirin did not eat. He rested his elbows on the table, watching the Brightlord dine. “I wished to offer you the chance to eat in peace,” Roshone said eventually, “before we talked of serious matters. But you don’t seem inclined to partake of my generosity.” “No.” “Very well,” Roshone said, taking a piece of flatbread
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from the basket and wrapping it around his skewer, pulling off several vegetable chunks at once and eating them with the bread. “Then tell me. How long do you think you can defy me? Your family is destitute.” “We do just fine,” Kal cut in. Lirin glanced at him, but did not chastise him for speaking. “My son is correct. We can live. And if that doesn’t work, we can leave. I will not bend to your will, Roshone.” “If you left,” Roshone said, holding up a finger, “I would contact your new citylord and tell him of the spheres stolen from me.” “I would win an inquest over that. Besides, as a surgeon, I am immune to most demands you could make.” It was true; men and their apprentices who served an essential function in towns were afforded special protection, even from lighteyes. The Vorin legal code of citizenship was complex enough that Kaladin still had difficulty understanding it. “Yes, you would win an inquest,” Roshone said. “You were so meticulous, preparing the exact right documents. You were the only one with Wistiow when he stamped them. Odd, that none of his clerks were there.” “Those clerks read him the documents.” “And then left the room.” “Because they were ordered to leave by Brightlord Wistiow. They have admitted this, I believe.” Roshone shrugged. “I don’t need to prove that you stole the spheres, surgeon. I simply have to continue doing as I have been. I know that your family eats scraps. How long will you continue to make them suffer for your pride?” “They won’t be intimidated. And neither will I.” “I’m not asking if you’re intimidated. I’m asking if you’re starving.” “Not by any means,” Lirin said, voice growing dry. “If we lack for something to eat, we can feast upon the attention you lavish upon us, Brightlord. We feel your eyes watching, hear your whispers to the townspeople. Judging from the degree of your concern with us, it would seem that you are the one who is intimidated.” Roshone fell still, skewer held limply in his hand, brilliant green eyes narrowed, lips pursed tight. In the dark, those eyes almost seemed to glow. Kal had to stop himself from cringing under the weight of that disapproving gaze. There was an air of command about lighteyes like Roshone. He’s not a real lighteyes! He’s a reject. I’ll see real ones eventually. Men of honor. Lirin held the gaze evenly. “Every month we resist is a blow to your authority. You can’t have me arrested, since I would win an inquest. You’ve tried to turn the other people against me, but they know—deep down—that they need me.” Roshone leaned forward. “I do not like your little town.” Lirin frowned at the odd response. “I do not like being treated like an exile,” Roshone continued. “I do not like living so far from anything—everything—important. And most of all, I do not like darkeyes who think themselves above their stations.” “I have trouble feeling sympathy for you.” Roshone sneered. He looked down at
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his meal, as if it had lost any flavor. “Very well. Let us make an…accommodation. I will take nine-tenths of the spheres. You can have the rest.” Kal stood up indignantly. “My father will never—” “Kal,” Lirin cut in. “I can speak for myself.” “Surely you won’t make a deal, though.” Lirin didn’t reply immediately. Finally, he said, “Go to the kitchens, Kal. Ask them if they have some food more to your tastes.” “Father, no—” “Go, son.” Lirin’s voice was firm. Was it true? After all of this, would his father simply capitulate? Kal felt his face grow red, and he fled the dining room. He knew the way to the kitchens. During his childhood, he’d often dined there with Laral. He left not because he was told to, but because he didn’t want his father or Roshone to see his emotions: chagrin at having stood to denounce Roshone when his father planned to make a deal, humiliation that his father would consider a deal, frustration at being banished. Kal was mortified to find himself crying. He passed a couple of Roshone’s house soldiers standing at the doorway, lit only by a very low-trimmed oil lamp on the wall. Their rough features were highlighted in amber hues. Kal hastened past them, turning a corner before pausing beside a plant stand, struggling with his emotions. The stand displayed an indoor vine-bud, one bred to remain open; a few conelike flowers climbed up from its vestigial shell. The lamp on the wall above it burned with a tiny, strangled light. These were the back rooms of the mansion, near the servant quarters, and spheres were not used for light here. Kal leaned back, breathing in and out. He felt like one of the ten fools—specifically Cabine, who acted like a child though he was adult. But what was he to think of Lirin’s actions? He wiped his eyes, then pushed his way through the swinging doors into the kitchens. Roshone still employed Wistiow’s chef. Barm was a tall, slender man with dark hair that he wore braided. He walked down the line of his kitchen counter, giving instructions to his various subchefs as a couple of parshmen walked in and out through the mansion’s back doors, carrying in crates of food. Barm carried a long metal spoon, which banged on a pot or pan hanging from the ceiling each time he gave an order. He barely spared Kal a brown-eyed glance, then told one of his servants to go fetch some flatbread and fruited tallew rice. A child’s meal. Kal felt even more embarrassed that Barm had known instantly why he had been sent to the kitchens. Kal walked to the dining nook to wait for the food. It was a whitewashed alcove with a slate-topped table. He sat down, elbows on the stone, head on his hands. Why did it make him so angry to think that his father might bargain away most of the spheres in exchange for safety? True, if that happened, there wouldn’t be enough to send Kal to
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Kharbranth. But he’d already decided to become a soldier. So it didn’t matter. Did it? I am going to join the army, Kal thought. I’ll run away, I’ll… Suddenly, that dream—that plan—seemed incredibly childish. It belonged to a boy who ought to eat fruited meals and deserved to be sent away when the men talked of important topics. For the first time, the thought of not training with the surgeons filled him with regret. The door into the kitchens banged open. Roshone’s son, Rillir, sauntered in, chatting with the person behind him. “…don’t know why Father insists on keeping everything so dreary around here all the time. Oil lamps in the hallways? Could he be any more provincial? It would do him some real good if I could get him out on a hunt or two. We might as well get some use out of being in this remote place.” Rillir noticed Kal sitting there, but passed over him as one might register the presence of a stool or a shelf for wine: noting it, but otherwise ignoring it. Kal’s own eyes were on the person who followed Rillir. Laral. Wistiow’s daughter. So much had changed. It had been so long, and seeing her brought up old emotions. Shame, excitement. Did she know that his parents had been hoping to marry him to her? Merely seeing her again almost flustered him completely. But no. His father could look Roshone in the eyes. He could do the same with her. Kal stood up and nodded to her. She glanced at him, and blushed faintly, walking in with an old nurse in tow—a chaperone. What had happened to the Laral he’d known, the girl with the loose yellow and black hair who liked climbing on rocks and running through fields? Now she was wrapped up in sleek yellow silk, a stylish lighteyed woman’s dress, her neatly coiffed hair dyed black to hide the blond. Her left hand was hidden modestly in her sleeve. Laral looked like a lighteyes. Wistiow’s wealth—what was left of it—had gone to her. And when Roshone had been given authority over Hearthstone and granted the mansion and surrounding lands, Highprince Sadeas had given Laral a dowry in compensation. “You,” Rillir said, nodding to Kal and speaking in a smooth, city accent. “Be a good lad and fetch us some supper. We’ll take it here in the nook.” “I’m not a kitchen servant.” “So?” Kal flushed. “If you’re expecting some kind of tip or reward for just fetching me a meal…” “I’m not—I mean—” Kal looked to Laral. “Tell him, Laral.” She looked away. “Well, go on, boy,” she said. “Do as you’re told. We’re hungry.” Kal gaped at her, then felt his face redden even more. “I’m…I’m not going to fetch you anything!” he managed to say. “I wouldn’t do it no matter how many spheres you offer me. I’m not an errand boy, I’m a surgeon.” “Oh, you’re that one’s son.” “I am,” Kal said, surprised at how proudly he felt those words. “I’m not going to be bullied
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by you, Rillir Roshone. Just like my father isn’t bullied by yours.” Except, they are making a deal right now…. “Father didn’t mention how amusing you were,” Rillir said, leaning back against the wall. He seemed a decade older than Kal, not a mere two years. “So you find it shameful to fetch a man his meal? Being a surgeon makes you that much better than the kitchen staff?” “Well, no. It’s just not my Calling.” “Then what is your Calling?” “Making sick people well.” “And if I don’t eat, won’t I be sick? So couldn’t you call it your duty to see me fed?” Kal frowned. “It’s…well, it’s not the same thing at all.” “I see it as being very similar.” “Look, why don’t you just go get yourself some food?” “It’s not my Calling.” “Then what is your Calling?” Kal returned, throwing the man’s own words back at him. “I’m cityheir,” Rillir said. “My duty is to lead—to see that jobs get done and that people are occupied in productive work. And as such, I give important tasks to idling darkeyes to make them useful.” Kal hesitated, growing angry. “You see how his little mind works,” Rillir said to Laral. “Like a dying fire, burning what little fuel it has, pumping out smoke. Ah, and look, his face grows red from the heat of it.” “Rillir, please,” Laral said, laying her hand on his arm. Rillir glanced at her, then rolled his eyes. “You’re as provincial as my father sometimes, dear.” He stood up straight and—with a look of resignation—led her past the nook and into the kitchen proper. Kal sat back down hard, nearly bruising his legs on the bench with the force of it. A serving boy brought him his food and set it on the table, but that only reminded Kal of his childishness. So he didn’t eat it; he just stared at it until, eventually, his father walked into the kitchen. Rillir and Laral were gone by then. Lirin walked to the alcove and surveyed Kal. “You didn’t eat.” Kal shook his head. “You should have. It was free. Come on.” They walked in silence from the mansion into the dark night. The carriage awaited them, and soon Kal again sat facing his father. The driver climbed into place, making the vehicle quiver, and a snap of his whip set the horses in motion. “I want to be a surgeon,” Kal said suddenly. His father’s face—hidden in shadow—was unreadable. But when he spoke, he sounded confused. “I know that, son.” “No. I want to be a surgeon. I don’t want to run away to join the war.” Silence in the darkness. “You were considering that?” Lirin asked. “Yes,” Kal admitted. “It was childish. But I’ve decided for myself that I want to learn surgery instead.” “Why? What made you change?” “I need to know how they think,” Kal said, nodding back toward the mansion. “They’re trained to speak their sentences in knots, and I have to be able to face them and talk back at them.
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Not fold like…” He hesitated. “Like I did?” Lirin asked with a sigh. Kal bit his lip, but had to ask. “How many spheres did you agree to give him? Will I still have enough to go to Kharbranth?” “I didn’t give him a thing.” “But—” “Roshone and I talked for a time, arguing over amounts. I pretended to grow hotheaded and left.” “Pretended?” Kal asked, confused. His father leaned forward, whispering to make certain the driver couldn’t hear. With the bouncing and the noise of the wheels on the stone, there was little danger of that. “He has to think that I’m willing to bend. Today’s meeting was about giving the appearance of desperation. A strong front at first, followed by frustration, letting him think that he’d gotten to me. Finally a retreat. He’ll invite me again in a few months, after letting me ‘sweat.’” “But you won’t bend then, either?” Kal whispered. “No. Giving him any of the spheres would make him greedy for the rest. These lands don’t produce as they used to, and Roshone is nearly broke from losing political battles. I still don’t know which highlord was behind sending him here to torment us, though I wish I had him for a few moments in a dark room….” The ferocity with which Lirin said that shocked Kal. It was the closest he’d ever heard his father come to threatening real violence. “But why go through this in the first place?” Kal whispered. “You said that we can keep resisting him. Mother thinks so too. We won’t eat well, but we won’t starve.” His father didn’t reply, though he looked troubled. “You need to make him think that we’re capitulating,” Kal said. “Or that we’re close to doing so. So that he’ll stop looking for ways to undermine us? So he’ll focus his attention on making a deal and not—” Kal froze. He saw something unfamiliar in his father’s eyes. Something like guilt. Suddenly it made sense. Cold, terrible sense. “Stormfather,” Kal whispered. “You did steal the spheres, didn’t you?” His father remained silent, riding in the old carriage, shadowed and black. “That’s why you’ve been so tense since Wistiow died,” Kal whispered. “The drinking, the worrying…You’re a thief! We’re a family of thieves.” The carriage turned, and the violet light of Salas illuminated Lirin’s face. He didn’t look half so ominous from that angle—in fact, he looked fragile. He clasped his hands before him, eyes reflecting moonlight. “Wistiow was not lucid during the final days, Kal,” he whispered. “I knew that, with his death, we would lose the promise of a union. Laral had not reached her day of majority, and the new citylord wouldn’t let a darkeyes take her inheritance through marriage.” “So you robbed him?” Kal felt himself shrinking. “I made certain that promises were kept. I had to do something. I couldn’t trust to the generosity of the new citylord. Wisely, as you can see.” All of this time, Kal had assumed that Roshone was persecuting them out of malice and spite. But it
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turned out he was justified. “I can’t believe it.” “Does it change so much?” Lirin whispered. His face looked haunted in the dim light. “What is different now?” “Everything.” “And yet nothing. Roshone still wants those spheres, and we still deserve them. Wistiow, if he’d been fully lucid, would have given us those spheres. I’m certain.” “But he didn’t.” “No.” Things were the same, yet different. One step, and the world flipped upside down. The villain became the hero, the hero the villain. “I—” Kal said. “I can’t decide if what you did was incredibly brave or incredibly wrong.” Lirin sighed. “I know how you feel.” He sat back. “Please, don’t tell Tien what we’ve done.” What we’ve done. Hesina had helped him. “When you are older, you’ll understand.” “Maybe,” Kal said, shaking his head. “But one thing hasn’t changed. I want to go to Kharbranth.” “Even on stolen spheres?” “I’ll find a way to pay them back. Not to Roshone. To Laral.” “She’ll be a Roshone before too long,” Lirin said. “We should expect an engagement between her and Rillir before the year is out. Roshone will not let her slip away, not now that he’s lost political favor in Kholinar. She represents one of the few chances his son has for an alliance with a good house.” Kal felt his stomach turn at the mention of Laral. “I have to learn. Perhaps I can…” Can what, he thought. Come back and convince her to leave Rillir for me? Ridiculous. He looked up suddenly at his father, who had bowed his head, looking sorrowful. He was a hero. A villain too. But a hero to his family. “I won’t tell Tien,” Kal whispered. “And I’m going to use the spheres to travel to Kholinar and study.” His father looked up. “I want to learn to face lighteyes, like you do,” Kal said. “Any of them can make a fool of me. I want to learn to talk like them, think like them.” “I want you to learn so that you can help people, son. Not so you can get back at the lighteyes.” “I think I can do both. If I can learn to be clever enough.” Lirin snorted. “You’re plenty clever, son. You’ve got enough of your mother in you to talk circles around a lighteyes. The university will show you how, Kal.” “I want to start going by my full name,” he replied, surprising himself. “Kaladin.” It was a man’s name. He’d always disliked how it sounded like the name of a lighteyes. Now it seemed to fit. He wasn’t a darkeyed farmer, but he wasn’t a lighteyed lord either. Something in between. Kal had been a child who wanted to join the army because it was what other boys dreamed of. Kaladin would be a man who learned surgery and all the ways of the lighteyes. And someday he would return to this town and prove to Roshone, Rillir, and Laral herself that they had been wrong to dismiss him. “Very well,” Lirin said. “Kaladin.” Kaladin floated. Persistent
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fever, accompanied by cold sweats and hallucinations. Likely cause is infected wounds; clean with antiseptic to ward away rotspren. Keep the subject hydrated. He was back in Hearthstone with his family. Only he was a grown man. The soldier he had become. And he didn’t fit with them anymore. His father kept asking, How did this happen? You said you wanted to become a surgeon. A surgeon… Broken ribs. Caused by trauma to the side, inflicted by a beating. Wrap the chest and prevent the subject from taking part in strenuous activity. Occasionally, he’d open his eyes and see a dark room. It was cold, the walls made of stone, with a high roof. Other people lay in lines, covered in blankets. Corpses. They were corpses. This was a ware house where they were lined up for sale. Who bought corpses? Highprince Sadeas. He bought corpses. They still walked after he bought them, but they were corpses. The stupid ones refused to accept it, pretending they were alive. Lacerations on face, arms, and chest. Outer layer of skin stripped away in several patches. Caused by prolonged exposure to highstorm winds. Bandage wounded areas, apply a denocax salve to encourage new skin growth. Time was passing. A lot of it. He should be dead. Why wasn’t he dead? He wanted to lie back and let it happen. But no. No. He had failed Tien. He had failed Goshel. He had failed his parents. He had failed Dallet. Dear Dallet. He would not fail Bridge Four. He would not! Hypothermia, caused by extreme cold. Warm subject and force him to remain seated. Do not let him sleep. If he survives a few hours, there will likely be no lasting aftereffects. If he survives a few hours… Bridgemen weren’t supposed to survive. Why would Lamaril say that? What army would employ men who were supposed to die? His perspective had been too narrow, too shortsighted. He needed to understand the army’s objectives. He watched the battle’s progress, horrified. What had he done? He needed to go back and change it. But no. He was wounded, wasn’t he? He was bleeding on the ground. He was one of the fallen spearmen. He was a bridgeman from Bridge Two, betrayed by those fools in Bridge Four, who diverted all of the archers. How dare they? How dare they? How dare they survive by killing me! Strained tendons, ripped muscles, bruised and cracked bones, and pervasive soreness caused by extreme conditions. Enforce bed rest by any means necessary. Check for large and persistent bruises or pallor caused by internal hemorrhaging. That can be life-threatening. Be prepared for surgery. He saw the deathspren. They were fist-size and black, with many legs and deep red eyes that glowed, leaving trails of burning light. They clustered around him, skittering this way and that. Their voices were whispers, scratchy sounds like paper being torn. They terrified him, but he couldn’t escape them. He could barely move. Only the dying could see deathspren. You saw them, then died. Only the very, very lucky
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few survived after that. Deathspren knew when the end was close. Blistered fingers and toes, caused by frostnip. Make sure to apply antiseptic to any blisters that break. Encourage the body’s natural healing. Permanent damage is unlikely. Standing before the deathspren was a tiny figure of light. Not translucent, as she had always appeared before, but of pure white light. That soft, feminine face had a nobler, more angular cast to it now, like a warrior from a forgotten time. Not childlike at all. She stood guard on his chest, holding a sword made of light. That glow was so pure, so sweet. It seemed to be the glow of life itself. Whenever one of the deathspren got too close, she would charge at it, wielding her radiant blade. The light warded them off. But there were a lot of deathspren. More and more each time he was lucid enough to look. Severe delusions caused by trauma to the head. Maintain observation of subject. Do not allow alcohol intake. Enforce rest. Administer fathom bark to reduce cranial swelling. Firemoss can be used in extreme cases, but beware letting the subject form an addiction. If medication fails, trepanning the skull may be needed to relieve pressure. Usually fatal. Teft entered the barrack at midday. Ducking into the shadowy interior was like entering a cave. He glanced to the left, where the other wounded usually slept. They were all outside at the moment, getting some sun. All five were doing well, even Leyten. Teft passed the lines of rolled-up blankets at the sides of the room, walking to the back of the chamber where Kaladin lay. Poor man, Teft thought. What’s worse, being sick near to death, or having to stay all the way back here, away from the light? It was necessary. Bridge Four walked a precarious line. They had been allowed to cut Kaladin down, and so far nobody had tried to stop them from caring for him. Practically the entire army had heard Sadeas give Kaladin to the Stormfather for judgment. Gaz had come to see Kaladin, then had snorted to himself in amusement. He’d likely told his superiors that Kaladin would die. Men didn’t live long with wounds like those. Yet Kaladin hung on. Soldiers were going out of their way to try to get a peek at him. His survival was incredible. People were talking in camp. Given to the Stormfather for judgment, then spared. A miracle. Sadeas wouldn’t like that. How long would it be before one of the lighteyes decided to relieve their brightlord of the problem? Sadeas couldn’t take any overt action—not without losing a great deal of credibility—but a quiet poisoning or suffocation would abbreviate the embarrassment. So Bridge Four kept Kaladin as far from outside eyes as possible. And they always left someone with him. Always. Storming man, Teft thought, kneeling beside the feverish patient in his tousled blankets, eyes closed, face sweaty, body bound with a frightful number of bandages. Most were stained red. They didn’t have the money to change them often.
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Skar kept watch currently. The short, strong-faced man sat at Kaladin’s feet. “How is he?” Teft asked. Skar spoke softly. “He seems to be getting worse, Teft. I heard him mumble about dark shapes, thrashing and telling them to keep back. He opened his eyes. He didn’t seem to see me, but he saw something. I swear it.” Deathspren, Teft thought, feeling a chill. Kelek preserve us. “I’ll take a turn,” Teft said, sitting. “You go get something to eat.” Skar stood, looking pale. It would crush the others’ spirit for Kaladin to survive the highstorm, then die of his wounds. Skar shuffled from the room, shoulders slumped. Teft watched Kaladin for a long while, trying to gather his thoughts, his emotions. “Why now?” he whispered. “Why here? After so many have watched and waited, you come here?” But of course, Teft was getting ahead of himself. He didn’t know for certain. He only had assumptions and hopes. No, not hopes—fears. He had rejected the Envisagers. And yet, here he was. He fished in his pocket and pulled out three small diamond spheres. It had been a long, long while since he’d saved anything of his wages, but he’d held on to these, thinking, worrying. They glowed with Stormlight in his hand. Did he really want to know? Gritting his teeth, Teft moved closer to Kaladin’s side, looking down at the unconscious man’s face. “You bastard,” he whispered. “You storming bastard. You took a bunch of hanged men and lifted them up just enough to breathe. Now you’re going to leave them? I won’t have it, you hear. I won’t.” He pressed the spheres into Kaladin’s hand, wrapping the limp fingers around them, then laying the hand on Kaladin’s abdomen. Then Teft sat back on his heels. What would happen? All the Envisagers had were stories and legends. Fool’s tales, Teft had called them. Idle dreams. He waited. Of course, nothing happened. You’re as big a fool as any, Teft, he told himself. He reached for Kaladin’s hand. Those spheres would buy a few drinks. Kaladin gasped suddenly, drawing in a short, quick, powerful breath. The glow in his hand faded. Teft froze, eyes widening. Wisps of Light began to rise from Kaladin’s body. It was faint, but there was no mistaking that glowing white Stormlight streaming off his frame. It was as if Kaladin had been bathed in sudden heat, and his very skin steamed. Kaladin’s eyes snapped open, and they leaked light too, faintly colored amber. He gasped again loudly, and the trailing wisps of light began to twist around the exposed cuts on his chest. A few of them pulled together and knit themselves up. Then it was gone, the Light of those tiny chips expended. Kaladin’s eyes closed and he relaxed. His wounds were still bad, his fever still raging, but some color had returned to his skin. The puffy redness around several cuts had diminished. “My God,” Teft said, realizing he was trembling. “Almighty, cast from heaven to dwell in our hearts…It is true.” He bowed his
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head to the rock floor, squeezing his eyes shut, tears leaking from their corners. Why now? he thought again. Why here? And, in the name of all heaven, why me? He knelt for a hundred heartbeats, counting, thinking, worrying. Eventually, he pulled himself to his feet and retrieved the spheres—now dun—from Kaladin’s hand. He’d need to trade them for spheres with Light in them. Then he could return and let Kaladin drain those as well. He’d have to be careful. A few spheres each day, but not too many. If the boy healed too quickly, it would draw too much attention. And I need to tell the Envisagers, he thought. I need to… The Envisagers were gone. Dead, because of what he had done. If there were others, he had no idea how to locate them. Who would he tell? Who would believe him? Kaladin himself probably didn’t understand what he was doing. Best to keep it quiet, at least until he could figure out what to do about it. Shallan’s hand flew across the drawing board, moving as if of its own accord, charcoal scratching, sketching, smudging. Thick lines first, like trails of blood left by a thumb drawn across rough granite. Tiny lines like scratches made by a pin. She sat in her closetlike stone chamber in the Conclave. No windows, no ornamentation on the granite walls. Just the bed, her trunk, the nightstand, and the small desk that doubled as a drawing table. A single ruby broam cast a bloody light on her sketch. Usually, to produce a vibrant drawing, she had to consciously memorize a scene. A blink, freezing the world, imprinting it into her mind. She hadn’t done that during Jasnah’s annihilation of the thieves. She’d been too frozen by horror or morbid fascination. Despite that, she could see each of those scenes in her mind just as vividly as if she’d deliberately memorized them. And these memories didn’t vanish when she drew them. She couldn’t rid her mind of them. Those deaths were burned into her. She sat back from her drawing board, hand shaking, the picture before her an exact charcoal representation of the suffocating nightscape, squeezed between alley walls, a tortured figure of flame rising toward the sky. At that moment, its face still held its shape, shadow eyes wide and burning lips agape. Jasnah’s hand was toward the figure, as if warding, or worshipping. Shallan drew her charcoal-stained fingers to her chest, staring at her creation. It was one of dozens of drawings she’d done during the last few days. The man turned into fire, the other frozen into crystal, the two transmuted to smoke. She could only draw one of those two fully; she’d been facing down the alleyway to the east. Her drawings of the fourth man’s death were of smoke rising, clothing already on the ground. She felt guilty for being unable to record his death. And she felt stupid for that guilt. Logic did not condemn Jasnah. Yes, the princess had gone willingly into danger, but that didn’t remove
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responsibility from those who had chosen to hurt her. The men’s actions were reprehensible. Shallan had spent the days poring through books on philosophy, and most ethical frameworks exonerated the princess. But Shallan had been there. She’d watched those men die. She’d seen the terror in their eyes, and she felt terrible. Hadn’t there been another way? Kill or be killed. That was the Philosophy of Starkness. It exonerated Jasnah. Actions are not evil. Intent is evil, and Jasnah’s intent had been to stop men from harming others. That was the Philosophy of Purpose. It lauded Jasnah. Morality is separate from the ideals of men. It exists whole somewhere, to be approached—but never truly understood—by the mortal. The Philosophy of Ideals. It claimed that removing evil was ultimately moral, and so in destroying evil men, Jasnah was justified. Objective must be weighed against methods. If the goal is worthy, then the steps taken are worthwhile, even if some of them—on their own—are reprehensible. The Philosophy of Aspiration. It, more than any, called Jasnah’s actions ethical. Shallan pulled the sheet from her drawing board and tossed it down beside the others scattered across her bed. Her fingers moved again, clutching the charcoal pencil, beginning a new picture on the blank sheet strapped in place on the table, unable to escape. Her theft nagged at her as much as the killings did. Ironically, Jasnah’s demand that Shallan study moralistic philosophy forced her to contemplate her own, terrible actions. She’d come to Kharbranth to steal the fabrial, then use it to save her brothers and their house from massive debt and destruction. Yet in the end, this wasn’t why Shallan had stolen the Soulcaster. She’d taken it because she was angry with Jasnah. If the intentions were more important than the action, then she had to condemn herself. Perhaps the Philosophy of Aspiration—which stated that objectives were more important than the steps taken to achieve them—would agree with what she’d done, but that was the philosophy she found most reprehensible. Shallan sat here sketching, condemning Jasnah. But Shallan was the one who had betrayed a woman who had trusted her and taken her in. Now she was planning to commit heresy with the Soulcaster by using it although she was not an ardent. The Soulcaster itself lay in the hidden part of Shallan’s trunk. Three days, and Jasnah had said nothing about the disappearance. She wore the fake each day. She said nothing, acted no differently. Maybe she hadn’t tried Soulcasting. Almighty send that she didn’t go out and put herself into danger again, expecting to be able to use the fabrial to kill men who attacked her. Of course, there was one other aspect of that night that Shallan had to think of. She carried a concealed weapon that she hadn’t used. She felt foolish for not even thinking of getting it out that night. But she wasn’t accustomed to— Shallan froze, realizing for the first time what she’d been drawing. Not another scene from the alleyway, but a lavish room with a thick,
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ornamented rug and swords on the walls. A long dining table, set with a half-eaten meal. And a dead man in fine clothing, lying face-first on the floor, blood pooling around him. She jumped back, tossing aside the charcoal, then crumpled up the paper. Shaking, she moved over and sat down on the bed among the pictures. Dropping the crumpled drawing, she raised her fingers to her forehead, feeling the cold sweat there. Something was wrong with her, with her drawings. She had to get out. Escape the death, the philosophy and the questions. She stood and hurriedly strode into the main room of Jasnah’s quarters. The princess herself was away researching, as always. She hadn’t demanded that Shallan come to the Veil today. Was that because she realized that her ward needed time to think alone? Or was it because she suspected Shallan of stealing the Soulcaster, and no longer trusted her? Shallan hurried through the room. It was furnished only with the basics provided by King Taravangian. Shallan pulled open the door to the hallway, and nearly ran into a master-servant who had been reaching up to knock. The woman started, and Shallan let out a yelp. “Brightness,” the woman said, bowing immediately. “Apologies. But one of your spanreeds is flashing.” The woman held up the reed, affixed on the side with a small blinking ruby. Shallan breathed in and out, stilling her heart. “Thank you,” she said. She, like Jasnah, left her spanreeds in the care of servants because she was often away from her rooms, and was likely to miss any attempt to contact her. Still flustered, she was tempted to leave the thing and continue on her way. However, she did need to speak with her brothers, Nan Balat particularly, and he’d been away the last few times she’d contacted home. She took the spanreed and closed the door. She didn’t dare return to her rooms, with all of those sketches accusing her, but there was a desk and a spanreed board in the main room. She sat there, then twisted the ruby. Shallan? the reed wrote. Are you comfortable? It was a code phrase, meant to indicate to her that it was indeed Nan Balat—or, at least, his betrothed—on the other side. My back hurts and my wrist itches, she wrote back, giving the other half of the code phrase. I’m sorry I missed your other communications, Nan Balat sent. I had to attend a feast in Father’s name. It was with Sur Kamar, so it wasn’t really something I could miss, despite the day of traveling each way. It’s all right, Shallan wrote. She took a deep breath. I have the item. She turned the gem. The reed was still for a long moment. Finally, a hurried hand wrote, Praise the Heralds. Oh, Shallan. You’ve done it! You are on your way back to us, then? How can you use the spanreed on the ocean? Are you in port? I haven’t left, Shallan wrote. What? Why? Because it would be too suspicious, she wrote. Think
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about it, Nan Balat. If Jasnah tries the item and finds it broken, she might not immediately decide that she’s been had. That changes if I’ve suddenly and suspiciously left for home. I have to wait until she’s made the discovery, then see what she does next. If she realizes that her fabrial was replaced with a fake, then I can deflect her toward other culprits. She’s already suspicious of the ardentia. If—on the other hand—she assumes that her fabrial has broken somehow, I’ll know we’re free. She twisted the gem, setting the spanreed in place. The question she’d been expecting came next. And if she immediately assumes that you did it? Shallan, what if you can’t deflect her suspicion? What if she orders a search of your chambers and they find the hidden compartment? She picked up the pen. Then it is still better for me to be here, she wrote. Balat, I have learned much about Jasnah Kholin. She is incredibly focused and determined. She will not let me escape if she thinks I have robbed her. She will hunt me down, and will use all of her resources to exact retribution. We’d have our own king and highprinces on our property in days, demanding that we turn over the fabrial. Stormfather! I’ll bet Jasnah has contacts in Jah Keved that she could reach before I got back. I’d find myself in custody the moment I landed. Our only hope is to deflect her. If that doesn’t work, better for me to be here and suffer her wrath quickly. Likely she would take the Soulcaster and banish me from her sight. If we make her work and chase after me, though…She can be very ruthless, Balat. It would not go well for us. The response was long in coming. When did you get so good at logic, small one? he finally sent. I see that you’ve thought this through. Better than I have, at least. But Shallan, our time is running out. I know, she wrote. You said you could hold things together for a few more months. I ask you to do that. Give me two or three weeks, at least, to see what Jasnah does. Besides, while I am here, I can look into how the thing works. I haven’t found any books that give hints, but there are so many here, maybe I just haven’t found the right one yet. Very well, he wrote. A few weeks. Be careful, small one. The men who gave Father his fabrial visited again. They asked after you. I’m worried about them. Even more than I worry about our finances. They disturb me in a profound way. Farewell. Farewell, she wrote back. So far, there had been no hint of reaction from the princess. She hadn’t even mentioned the Soulcaster. That made Shallan nervous. She wished that Jasnah would just say something. The waiting was excruciating. Each day, while she sat with Jasnah, Shallan’s stomach churned with anxiety until she was nauseated. At least—considering the killings a few days ago—Shallan had
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a very good excuse for looking disturbed. Cold, calm logic. Jasnah herself would be proud. A knock came at the door, and Shallan quickly gathered up the conversation she’d had with Nan Balat and burned it in the hearth. A palace maid entered a moment later, carrying a basket in the crook of her arm. She smiled at Shallan. It was time for the daily cleaning. Shallan had a strange moment of panic at seeing the woman. She wasn’t one of the maids Shallan recognized. What if Jasnah had sent her or someone else to search Shallan’s room? Had she done so already? Shallan nodded to the woman and then—to assuage her worries—she walked to her room and closed the door. She rushed to the chest and checked the hidden compartment. The fabrial was there. She lifted it out, inspecting it. Would she know if Jasnah somehow reversed the exchange? You’re being foolish, she told herself. Jasnah’s subtle, but she’s not that subtle. Still, Shallan stuffed the Soulcaster in her safepouch. It just barely fit inside the envelope-like cloth container. She’d feel safer knowing she had it on her while the maid cleaned her room. Besides, the safepouch might be a better hiding place for it than her trunk. By tradition, a woman’s safepouch was where she kept items of intimate or very precious import. To search one would be like strip-searching her—considering her rank, either would be virtually unthinkable unless she were obviously implicated in a crime. Jasnah could probably force it. But if Jasnah could do that, she could order a search of Shallan’s room, and her trunk would be under particular scrutiny. The truth was, if Jasnah chose to suspect her, there would be little Shallan could do to hide the fabrial. So the safepouch was as good a place as any. She gathered up the pictures she’d drawn and put them upside-down on the desk, trying not to look at them. She didn’t want those to be seen by the maid. Finally, she left, taking her portfolio. She felt that she needed to get outside and escape for a while. Draw something other than death and murder. The conversation with Nan Balat had only served to upset her more. “Brightness?” the maid asked. Shallan froze, but the maid held up a basket. “This was dropped off for you with the master-servants.” She hesitantly accepted it, looking inside. Bread and jam. A note, tied to one of the jars, read: Bluebar jam. If you like it, it means you’re mysterious, reserved, and thoughtful. It was signed Kabsal. Shallan placed the basket’s handle in the crook of her safearm’s elbow. Kabsal. Maybe she should go find him. She always felt better after a conversation with him. But no. She was going to leave; she couldn’t keep stringing him, or herself, along. She was afraid of where the relationship was going. Instead, she made her way to the main cavern and then to the Conclave’s exit. She walked out into the sunlight and took a deep breath, looking up into the
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sky as servants and attendants parted around her, swarming in and out of the Conclave. She held her portfolio close, feeling the cool breeze on her cheeks and the contrasting warmth of the sunlight pressing down on her hair and forehead. In the end, the most disturbing part was that Jasnah had been right. Shallan’s world of simple answers had been a foolish, childish place. She’d clung to the hope that she could find truth, and use it to explain—perhaps justify—what she had done back in Jah Keved. But if there was such a thing as truth, it was far more complicated and murky than she’d assumed. Some problems didn’t seem to have any good answers. Just a lot of wrong ones. She could choose the source of her guilt, but she couldn’t choose to be rid of that guilt entirely. Two hours—and about twenty quick sketches—later, Shallan felt far more relaxed. She sat in the palace gardens, sketchpad in her lap, drawing snails. The gardens weren’t as extensive as her father’s, but they were far more varied, not to mention blessedly secluded. Like many modern gardens, they were designed with walls of cultivated shalebark. This one’s made a maze of living stone. They were short enough that, when standing, she could see the way back to the entrance. But if she sat down on one of the numerous benches, she could feel alone and unseen. She’d asked a groundskeeper the name of the most prominent shalebark plant; he’d called it “plated stone.” A fitting name, as it grew in thin round sections that piled atop one another, like plates in a cupboard. From the sides, it looked like weathered rock that exposed hundreds of thin strata. Tiny little tendrils grew up out of pores, waving in the wind. The stonelike casings had a bluish shade, but the tendrils were yellowish. Her current subject was a snail with a low horizontal shell edged with little ridges. When she tapped, it would flatten itself into a rift in the shalebark, appearing to become part of the plated stone. It blended in perfectly. When she let it move, it nibbled at the shalebark—but didn’t chew it away. It’s cleaning the shalebark, she realized, continuing her sketch. Eating off the lichen and mold. Indeed, a cleaner trail extended behind it. Patches of a different kind of shalebark—with fingerlike protrusions growing up into the air from a central knob—grew alongside the plated stone. When she looked closely, she noted little cremlings—thin and multilegged—crawling along it, eating at it. Were they too cleaning it? Curious, she thought, beginning a sketch of the miniature cremlings. They had carapaces shaded like the shalebark’s fingers, while the snail’s shell was a near duplicate of the yellow and blue colorings of the plated stone. It was as if they had been designed by the Almighty in pairs, the plant giving safety to the animal, the animal cleaning the plant. A few lifespren—tiny, glowing green specks—floated around the shalebark mounds. Some danced amid the rifts in the bark, others in the air
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like dust motes zigzagging up, only to fall again. She used a finer-tipped charcoal pencil to scribble some thoughts about the relationship between the animals and the plants. She didn’t know of any books that spoke of relationships like this one. Scholars seemed to prefer studying big, dynamic animals, like greatshells or whitespines. But this seemed a beautiful, wondrous discovery to Shallan. Snails and plants can help one another, she thought. But I betray Jasnah. She glanced toward her safehand, and the pouch hidden inside. She felt more secure having the Soulcaster near. She hadn’t yet dared try to use it. She’d been too nervous about the theft, and had worried about using the object near Jasnah. Now, however, she was in a nook deep within the maze, with only one curving entrance into her dead end. She stood up casually, looking around. No one else was in the gardens, and she was far enough inside that it would take minutes for anyone to get to her. Shallan sat back down, setting aside her drawing pad and pencil. I might as well see if I can figure out how to use it, she thought. Maybe there’s no need to keep searching the Palanaeum for a solution. So long as she stood up and glanced about periodically, she could be certain she wouldn’t be approached or seen by accident. She removed the forbidden device. It was heavy in her hand. Solid. Taking a deep breath, she looped the chains over her fingers and around her wrist, the gemstones set against the back of her hand. The metal was cold, the chains loose. She flexed her hand, pulling the fabrial tight. She’d anticipated a feeling of power. Prickles on her skin, perhaps, or a sense of strength and might. But there was nothing. She tapped the three gemstones—she’d placed her smokestone into the third setting. Some other fabrials, like spanreeds, worked when you tapped the stones. But that was foolish, as she’d never seen Jasnah do that. The woman just closed her eyes and touched something, Soulcasting it. Smoke, crystal, and fire were what this Soulcaster was best at. Only once had she seen Jasnah create anything else. Hesitant, Shallan took a piece of broken shalebark from the base of one of the plants. She held it up in her freehand, then closed her eyes. Become smoke! she commanded. Nothing happened. Become crystal! she commanded instead. She cracked an eye. There was no change. Fire. Burn! You’re fire! You— She paused, realizing the stupidity of that. A mysteriously burned hand? No, that wouldn’t be at all suspicious. Instead, she focused on crystal. She closed her eyes again, holding the image of a piece of quartz in her mind. She tried to will the shalebark to change. Nothing happened, so she just tried focusing, imagining the shalebark transforming. After a few minutes of failure, she tried making the pouch change instead, then tried the bench, then tried one of her hairs. Nothing worked. Shallan checked to make certain she was still alone, then sat down,
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frustrated. Nan Balat had asked Luesh how the devices worked, and he’d said that it was easier to show than explain. He’d promised to give them answers if she actually managed to steal Jasnah’s. Now he was dead. Was she doomed to carry this one back to her family, only to immediately give it away to those dangerous men, never using it to gain wealth to protect her house? All because they didn’t know how to activate it? The other fabrials she’d used had been simple to activate, but those were constructed by contemporary artifabrians. Soulcasters were fabrials from ancient times. They wouldn’t employ modern methods of activation. She stared at the glowing gemstones suspended on the back of her hand. How would she figure out the method of using a tool thousands of years old, one forbidden to any but ardents? She slid the Soulcaster back into her safepouch. It seemed she was back to searching the Palanaeum. That or asking Kabsal. But would she manage that without looking suspicious? She broke out his bread and jam, eating and thinking idly. If Kabsal didn’t know, and if she couldn’t find the answers by the time she left Kharbranth, were there other options? If she took the artifact to the Veden king—or maybe the ardents—might they be able to protect her family in exchange for the gift? After all, she couldn’t really be blamed for stealing from a heretic, and so long as Jasnah didn’t know who had the Soulcaster, they would be safe. For some reason, that made her feel even worse. Stealing the Soulcaster to save her family was one thing, but turning it over to the very ardents whom Jasnah disdained? It seemed a greater betrayal. Yet another difficult decision. Well then, she thought, it’s a good thing Jasnah is so determined to train me in how to deal with those. By the time all this is done, I should be quite the expert…. Kaladin stumbled into the light, shading his eyes against the burning sun, his bare feet feeling the transition from cold indoor stone to sun-warmed stone outside. The air was lightly humid, not muggy as it had been in previous weeks. He rested his hand on the wooden doorframe, his legs quivering rebelliously, his arms feeling as if he’d carried a bridge for three days straight. He breathed deeply. His side should have blazed with pain, but he felt only a residual soreness. Some of his deeper cuts were still scabbed over, but the smaller ones had vanished completely. His head was surprisingly clear. He didn’t even have a headache. He rounded the side of the barrack, feeling stronger with each step, though he kept his hand on the wall. Lopen followed behind; the Herdazian had been watching over Kaladin when he awoke. I should be dead, Kaladin thought. What is going on? On the other side of the barrack he was surprised to find the men carrying their bridge in daily practice. Rock ran at the front center, giving the marching beat as Kaladin had
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once done. They reached the other side of the lumberyard and turned around, charging back. Only when they were almost past the barrack did one of the men in front—Moash—notice Kaladin. He froze, nearly causing the entire bridge crew to trip. “What is wrong with you?” Torfin yelled from behind, head enveloped by the wood of the bridge. Moash didn’t listen. He ducked out from under the bridge, looking at Kaladin with wide eyes. Rock gave a hasty shout for the men to put down the bridge. More saw him, adopting the same reverent expressions as Moash. Hobber and Peet, their wounds sufficiently healed, had started practicing with the others. That was good. They’d be drawing pay again. The men walked up to Kaladin, silent in their leather vests. They kept their distance, hesitant, as if he were fragile. Or holy. Kaladin was bare-chested, his nearly healed wounds exposed, and wore only his knee-length bridgeman’s trousers. “You really need to practice what to do if one of you trips or stumbles, men,” Kaladin said. “When Moash stopped abruptly, you all about fell over. That could be a disaster on the field.” They stared at him, incredulous, and he couldn’t help but smile. In a moment, they crowded around him, laughing and thumping him on the back. It wasn’t an entirely appropriate welcome for a sick man, particularly when Rock did it, but Kaladin did appreciate their enthusiasm. Only Teft didn’t join in. The aging bridgeman stood at the side, arms folded. He seemed concerned. “Teft?” Kaladin asked. “You all right?” Teft snorted, but showed a hint of a grin. “I just figure those lads don’t bathe often enough for me to want to get close enough for a hug. No offense.” Kaladin laughed. “I understand.” His last “bath” had been the highstorm. The highstorm. The other bridgemen continued to laugh, asking how he felt, proclaiming that Rock would have to fix something extra special for their nightly fireside meal. Kaladin smiled and nodded, assuring them he felt well, but he was remembering the storm. He recalled it distinctly. Holding to the ring atop the building, his head down and eyes closed against the pelting torrent. He remembered Syl, standing protectively before him, as if she could turn back the storm itself. He couldn’t see her about now. Where was she? He also remembered the face. The Stormfather himself? Surely not. A delusion. Yes…yes, he’d certainly been delusional. Memories of deathspren were blended with relived parts of his life—and both mixed with strange, sudden shocks of strength—icy cold, but refreshing. It had been like the cold air of a crisp morning after a long night in a stuffy room, or like rubbing the sap of gulket leaves on sore muscles, making them feel warm and cold at the same time. He could remember those moments so clearly. What had caused them? The fever? “How long?” he said, checking over the bridgemen, counting them. Thirty-three, counting Lopen and the silent Dabbid. Almost all were accounted for. Impossible. If his ribs were healed, then he
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must have been unconscious for three weeks, at least. How many bridge runs? “Ten days,” Moash said. “Impossible,” Kaladin said. “My wounds—” “Is why we’re so surprised to see you up and walking!” Rock said, laughing. “You must have bones like granite. Is my name you should be having!” Kaladin leaned back against the wall. Nobody corrected Moash. An entire crew of men couldn’t lose track of the weeks like that. “Idolir and Treff?” he asked. “We lost them,” Moash said, growing solemn. “We did two bridge runs while you were unconscious. Nobody badly wounded, but two dead. We…we didn’t know how to help them.” That made the men grow subdued. But death was the way of bridgemen, and they couldn’t afford to dwell for long on the lost. Kaladin did decide, however, that he’d need to train a few of the others in healing. But how was he up and walking? Had he been less injured than he’d assumed? Hesitantly, he prodded at his side, feeling for broken ribs. Just a little sore. Other than the weakness, he felt as healthy as he ever had. Perhaps he should have paid a little more attention to his mother’s religious teachings. As the men turned back to talking and celebrating, he noticed the looks they gave him. Respectful, reverent. They remembered what he’d said before the highstorm. Looking back, Kaladin realized he’d been a little delirious. It now seemed an incredibly arrogant proclamation, not to mention that it smelled of prophecy. If the ardents discovered that… Well, he couldn’t undo what he’d done. He’d just have to continue. You were already balancing over a chasm, Kaladin thought to himself. Did you have to scale an even higher cliffside? A sudden, mournful horn call sounded across the camp. The bridgemen fell silent. The horn sounded twice more. “Figures,” Natam said. “We’re on duty?” Kaladin asked. “Yeah,” Moash said. “Line up!” Rock snapped. “You know what to do! Let’s show Captain Kaladin that we haven’t forgotten how to do this.” “‘Captain’ Kaladin?” Kaladin asked as the men lined up. “Sure, gancho,” Lopen said from beside him, speaking with that quick accent that seemed so at odds with his nonchalant attitude. “They tried to make Rock bridgeleader, sure, but we just started calling you ‘captain’ and him ‘squadleader.’ Made Gaz angry.” Lopen grinned. Kaladin nodded. The other men were so joyous, but he was finding it difficult to share their mood. As they formed up around their bridge, he began to realize the source of his melancholy. His men were right back where they’d started. Or worse. He was weakened and injured, and had offended the highprince himself. Sadeas would not be pleased when he learned that Kaladin had survived his fever. The bridgemen were still destined to be cut down one by one. The side carry had been a failure. He hadn’t saved his men, he’d just given them a short stay of execution. Bridgemen aren’t supposed to survive…. He suspected why that was. Gritting his teeth, he let go of the barrack wall and
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crossed to where the bridgemen stood in line, leaders of the sub-squads doing a quick check of their vests and sandals. Rock eyed Kaladin. “And what is this thing you believe you are doing?” “I’m joining you,” Kaladin said. “And what would you tell one of the men if they had just gotten up from a week with the fevers?” Kaladin hesitated. I’m not like the other men, he thought, then regretted it. He couldn’t start believing himself invincible. To run now with the crew, as weak as he was, would be sheer idiocy. “You’re right.” “You can help me and the moolie carry water, gancho,” Lopen said. “We’re a team now. Go on every run.” Kaladin nodded. “All right.” Rock eyed him. “If I’m feeling too weak at the end of the permanent bridges, I’ll go back. I promise.” Rock nodded reluctantly. The men marched under the bridge to the staging area, and Kaladin joined Lopen and Dabbid, filling waterskins. Kaladin stood at the edge of the precipice, hands clasped behind his back, sandaled toes at the very edge of the cliff. The chasm stared up at him, but he did not meet its gaze. He was focused on the battle being waged on the next plateau. This approach had been an easy one; they’d arrived at the same time as the Parshendi. Instead of bothering to kill bridgemen, the Parshendi had taken a defensive position in the center of the plateau, around the chrysalis. Now Sadeas’s men fought them. Kaladin’s brow was slick with sweat from the day’s heat, and he still felt a lingering exhaustion from his sickness. Yet it wasn’t nearly as bad as it should have been. The surgeon’s son was baffled. For the moment, the soldier overruled the surgeon. He was transfixed by the battle. Alethi spearmen in leathers and breastplates pressed a curved line against the Parshendi warriors. Most Parshendi used battle-axes or hammers, though a few wielded swords or clubs. They all had that red-orange armor growing from their skin, and they fought in pairs, singing all the while. It was the worst kind of battle, the kind that was close. Often, you’d lose far fewer men in a skirmish where your enemies quickly gained the upper hand. When that happened, your commander would order the retreat to cut his losses. But close battles…they were brutal, blood-soaked things. Watching the fighting—the bodies dropped to the rocks, the weapons flashing, the men pushed off the plateau—reminded him of his first fights as a spearman. His commander had been shocked at how easily Kaladin dealt with seeing blood. Kaladin’s father would have been shocked at how easily Kaladin spilled it. There was a big difference between his battles in Alethkar and the fights on the Shattered Plains. There, he’d been surrounded by the worst—or at least worst-trained—soldiers in Alethkar. Men who didn’t hold their lines. And yet, for all their disorder, those fights had made sense to him. These here on the Shattered Plains still did not. That had been his miscalculation. He’d changed battlefield tactics
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before understanding them. He would not make that mistake again. Rock stepped up beside Kaladin, joined by Sigzil. The thick-limbed Horneater made for quite a contrast to the short, quiet Azish man. Sigzil’s skin was a deep brown—not true black, like some parshmen’s. He tended to keep to himself. “Is bad battle,” Rock said, folding his arms. “The soldiers will not be happy, whether or not they win.” Kaladin nodded absently, listening to the yells, screams, and curses. “Why do they fight, Rock?” “For money,” Rock said. “And for vengeance. You should know this thing. Is it not your king who Parshendi killed?” “Oh, I understand why we fight,” Kaladin said. “But the Parshendi. Why do they fight?” Rock grinned. “Is because they don’t very much like the idea of being beheaded for killing your king, I should think! Very unaccommodating of them.” Kaladin smiled, though he found mirth unnatural while watching men die. He had been trained too long by his father for any death to leave him unmoved. “Perhaps. But, then, why do they fight for the gemhearts? Their numbers are dwindling because of skirmishes like these.” “You know this thing?” Rock asked. “They raid less frequently than they used to,” Kaladin said. “People talk about it in camp. And they don’t strike as close to the Alethi side as they once did.” Rock nodded thoughtfully. “It seems logical. Ha! Perhaps we will soon win this fight and be going home.” “No,” Sigzil said softly. He had a very formal way of speaking, with barely a hint of an accent. What language did the Azish speak, anyway? Their kingdom was so distant that Kaladin had only ever met one other. “I doubt that. And I can tell you why they fight, Kaladin.” “Really?” “They must have Soulcasters. They need the gemstones for the same reason we do. To make food.” “It sounds reasonable,” Kaladin said, hands still clasped behind his back, feet in a wide stance. Parade rest still felt natural to him. “Just conjecture, but a reasonable one. Let me ask you something else, then. Why can’t bridgemen have shields?” “Because this thing makes us too slow,” Rock said. “No,” Sigzil said. “They could send bridgemen with shields out in front of the bridges, running in front of us. It wouldn’t slow anyone down. Yes, you would have to field more bridgemen—but you’d save enough lives with those shields to make up for the larger roster.” Kaladin nodded. “Sadeas fields more of us than he needs already. In most cases, more bridges land than he needs.” “But why?” Sigzil asked. “Because we make good targets,” Kaladin said softly, understanding. “We’re put out in front to draw Parshendi attention.” “Of course we are,” Rock said, shrugging. “Armies always do these things. The poorest and the least trained go first.” “I know,” Kaladin said, “but usually, they’re at least given some measure of protection. Don’t you see? We’re not just an expendable initial wave. We’re bait. We’re exposed, so the Parshendi can’t help but fire at us. It allows the regular
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soldiers to approach without being hurt. The Parshendi archers are aiming at the bridgemen.” Rock frowned. “Shields would make us less tempting,” Kaladin said. “That’s why he forbids them.” “Perhaps,” Sigzil said from the side, thoughtful. “But it seems foolish to waste troops.” “Actually, it isn’t foolish,” Kaladin said. “If you have to repeatedly attack fortified positions, you can’t afford to lose your trained troops. Don’t you see? Sadeas has only a limited number of trained men. But untrained ones are easy to find. Each arrow that strikes down a bridgeman is one that doesn’t hit a soldier you’ve spent a great deal of money outfitting and training. That’s why it’s better for Sadeas to field a large number of bridgemen, rather than a smaller—but protected—number.” He should have seen it earlier. He had been distracted by how important bridgemen were to the battles. If the bridges didn’t arrive at the chasms, then the army couldn’t cross. But each bridge crew was kept well stocked with bodies, and twice as many bridge crews were sent on an assault as were needed. Seeing a bridge fall must give the Parshendi a great sense of satisfaction, and they usually got to drop two or three bridges on every bad chasm run. Sometimes more. So long as bridgemen were dying, and the Parshendi didn’t spend their time firing on soldiers, Sadeas had reason to keep the bridgemen vulnerable. The Parshendi should have seen through it, but it was very hard to turn your arrow away from the unarmored man carrying the siege equipment. The Parshendi were said to be unsophisticated fighters. Indeed, watching the battle on the other plateau—studying it, focusing—he saw that was true. Where the Alethi maintained a straight, disciplined line—each man protecting his partners—the Parshendi attacked in independent pairs. The Alethi had superior technique and tactics. True, each of the Parshendi was superior in strength, and their skill with those axes was remarkable. But Sadeas’s Alethi troops were well trained in modern formations. Once they got a foothold—and if they could prolong the battle—their discipline often saw them to victory. The Parshendi haven’t fought in large-scale battles before this war, Kaladin decided. They’re used to smaller skirmishes, perhaps against other villages or clans. Several of the other bridgemen joined Kaladin, Rock, and Sigzil. Before long, the majority of them were standing there, some imitating Kaladin’s stance. It took another hour before the battle was won. Sadeas proved victorious, but Rock was right. The soldiers were grim; they’d lost many friends this day. It was a tired, battered group of spearmen that Kaladin and the others led back to camp. A few hours later, Kaladin sat on a chunk of wood beside Bridge Four’s nightly fire. Syl sat on his knee, having taken the form of a small, translucent blue and white flame. She’d come to him during the march back, spinning around gleefully to see him up and walking, but had given no explanation for her absence. The real fire crackled and popped, Rock’s large pot bubbling on top of it, some
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flamespren dancing on the logs. Every couple of seconds, someone asked Rock if the stew was done yet, often banging on his bowl with a good-natured smack of the spoon. Rock said nothing, stirring. They all knew that nobody ate until he declared the stew finished; he was very particular about not serving “inferior” food. The air smelled of boiling dumplings. The men were laughing. Their bridgeleader had survived execution and today’s bridge run hadn’t cost a single casualty. Spirits were high. Except for Kaladin’s. He understood now. He understood just how futile their struggle was. He understood why Sadeas hadn’t bothered to acknowledge Kaladin’s survival. He was already a bridgeman, and being a bridgeman was a death sentence. Kaladin had hoped to show Sadeas that his bridge crew could be efficient and useful. He’d hoped to prove that they deserved protection—shields, armor, training. Kaladin thought that if they acted like soldiers, maybe they would be seen as soldiers. None of that would work. A bridgeman who survived was, by definition, a bridgeman who had failed. His men laughed and enjoyed the fire. They trusted him. He’d done the impossible, surviving a highstorm, wounded, tied to a wall. Surely he would perform another miracle, this time for them. They were good men, but they thought like foot soldiers. The officers and the lighteyes would worry about the long term. The men were fed and happy, and that was enough for now. Not for Kaladin. He found himself face-to-face with the man he’d left behind. The one he’d abandoned that night he’d decided not to throw himself into the chasm. A man with haunted eyes, a man who had given up on caring or hoping. A walking corpse. I’m going to fail them, he thought. He couldn’t let them continue running bridges, dying off one by one. But he also couldn’t think of an alternative. And so their laughter tore at him. One of the men—Maps—stood, holding up his arms, quieting the others. It was the time between moons, and so he was lit mostly by the firelight; there was a spray of stars in the sky above. Several of those moved about, the tiny pinpricks of light chasing after one another, zipping around like distant, glowing insects. Starspren. They were rare. Maps was a flat-faced fellow, his beard bushy, his eyebrows thick. Everyone called him Maps because of the birthmark on his chest that he swore was an exact map of Alethkar, though Kaladin hadn’t been able to see the resemblance. Maps cleared his throat. “It’s a good night, a special night, and all. We’ve got our bridgeleader back.” Several of the men clapped. Kaladin tried not to show how sick he felt inside. “We’ve got good food coming,” Maps said. He eyed Rock. “It is coming, ain’t it, Rock?” “Is coming,” Rock said, stirring. “You’re sure about that? We could go on another bridge run. Give you a little extra time, you know, five or six more hours….” Rock gave him a fierce look. The men laughed, several banging their bowls
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with their spoons. Maps chuckled, then he reached to the ground behind the stone he was using for a seat. He pulled out a paper-wrapped package and tossed it to Rock. Surprised, the tall Horneater barely caught it, nearly dropping it into the stew. “From all of us,” Maps said, a little awkwardly, “for making us stew each night. Don’t think we haven’t noticed how hard you work on it. We relax while you cook. And you always serve everyone else first. So we bought you something to thank you.” He wiped his nose on his arm, spoiling the moment slightly, and sat back down. Several of the other bridgemen thumped him on the back, complimenting his speech. Rock unwrapped the package and stared into it for a long while. Kaladin leaned forward, trying to get a look at the contents. Rock reached in and held the item up. It was a straight razor of gleaming silvery steel; there was a length of wood covering the sharp side. Rock pulled this off, inspecting the blade. “You airsick fools,” he said softly. “Is beautiful.” “There’s a piece of polished steel too,” said Peet. “For a mirror. And some beard soap and a leather strop for sharpening.” Amazingly, Rock grew teary-eyed. He turned away from the pot, bearing his gifts. “Stew is ready,” he said. Then he ran into the barrack building. The men sat quietly. “Stormfather,” youthful Dunny finally said, “you think we did the right thing? I mean, the way he complains and all…” “I think it was perfect,” Teft said. “Just give the big lout some time to recover.” “Sorry we didn’t get you nothin’, sir,” Maps said to Kaladin. “We didn’t know you’d be awake and all.” “It’s all right,” Kaladin said. “Well,” Skar said. “Is someone going to serve that stew, or will we all just sit here hungry until it burns?” Dunny jumped up, grabbing the ladle. The men gathered around the pot, jostling one another as Dunny served. Without Rock there to snap at them and keep them in line, it was something of a melee. Only Sigzil did not join in. The quiet, dark-skinned man sat to the side, eyes reflecting the flames. Kaladin rose. He was worried—terrified, really—that he might become that wretch again. The one who had given up on caring because he saw no alternative. So he sought conversation, walking over toward Sigzil. His motion disturbed Syl, who sniffed and buzzed up onto his shoulder. She still held the form of a flickering flame; having that on his shoulder was even more distracting. He didn’t say anything; if she knew it bothered him, she’d be likely to do it more. She was still a windspren, after all. Kaladin sat down next to Sigzil. “Not hungry?” “They are more eager than I,” Sigzil said. “If previous evenings are a reliable guide, there will still be enough for me once they have filled their bowls.” Kaladin nodded. “I appreciated your analysis out on the plateau today.” “I am good at that, sometimes.” “You’re educated. You
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speak like it and you act like it.” Sigzil hesitated. “Yes,” he finally said. “Among my people, it is not a sin for a male to be keen of mind.” “It isn’t a sin for Alethi either.” “My experience is that you care only about wars and the art of killing.” “And what have you seen of us besides our army?” “Not much,” Sigzil admitted. “So, a man of education,” Kaladin said thoughtfully. “In a bridge crew.” “My education was never completed.” “Neither was mine.” Sigzil looked at him, curious. “I apprenticed as a surgeon,” Kaladin said. Sigzil nodded, thick dark hair falling around his shoulders. He’d been one of the only bridgemen who bothered shaving. Now that Rock had a razor, maybe that would change. “A surgeon,” he said. “I cannot say that is surprising, considering how you handled the wounded. The men say that you’re secretly a lighteyes of very high rank.” “What? But my eyes are dark brown!” “Pardon me,” Sigzil said. “I didn’t speak the right word—you don’t have the right word in your language. To you, a lighteyes is the same as a leader. In other kingdoms, though, other things make a man a…curse this Alethi language. A man of high birth. A brightlord, only without the eyes. Anyway, the men think you must have been raised outside of Alethkar. As a leader.” Sigzil looked back at the others. They were beginning to sit back down, attacking their stew with vigor. “It’s the way you lead so naturally, the way you make others want to listen to you. These are things they associate with lighteyes. And so they have invented a past for you. You will have a difficult time disabusing them of it now.” Sigzil eyed him. “Assuming it is a fabrication. I was there in the chasm the day you used that spear.” “A spear,” Kaladin said. “A darkeyed soldier’s weapon, not a lighteyes’s sword.” “To many bridgemen, the difference is minimal. All are so far above us.” “So what is your story?” Sigzil smirked. “I wondered if you were going to ask. The others mentioned that you have pried into their origins.” “I like to know the men I lead.” “And if some of us are murderers?” Sigzil asked quietly. “Then I’m in good company,” Kaladin said. “If it was a lighteyes you killed, then I might buy you a drink.” “Not a lighteyes,” Sigzil said. “And he is not dead.” “Then you’re not a murderer,” Kaladin said. “Not for want of trying.” Sigzil’s eyes grew distant. “I thought for certain I had succeeded. It was not the wisest choice I made. My master…” He trailed off. “Is he the one you tried to kill?” “No.” Kaladin waited, but no more information was forthcoming. A scholar, he thought. Or at least a man of learning. There has to be a way to use this. Find a way out of this death trap, Kaladin. Use what you have. There has to be a way. “You were right about the bridgemen,” Sigzil said. “We are sent
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to die. It is the only reasonable explanation. There is a place in the world. Marabethia. Have you heard of it?” “No,” Kaladin said. “It is beside the sea, to the north, in the Selay lands. The people are known for their great fondness for debate. At each intersection in the city they have small pedestals on which a man can stand and proclaim his arguments. It is said that everyone in Marabethia carries a pouch with an overripe fruit just in case they pass a proclaimer with whom they disagree.” Kaladin frowned. He hadn’t heard so many words from Sigzil in all the time they’d been bridgemen together. “What you said earlier, on the plateau,” Sigzil continued, eyes forward, “it made me think of the Marabethians. You see, they have a curious way of treating condemned criminals. They dangle them over the seaside cliff near the city, down near the water at high tide, with a cut sliced in each cheek. There is a particular species of greatshell in the depths there. The creatures are known for their succulent flavor, and of course they have gemhearts. Not nearly as large as the ones in these chasmfiends, but still nice. So the criminals, they become bait. A criminal may demand execution instead, but they say if you hang there for a week and are not eaten, then you can go free.” “And does that often happen?” Kaladin asked. Sigzil shook his head. “Never. But the prisoners almost always take the chance. The Marabethians have a saying for someone who refuses to see the truth of a situation. ‘You have eyes of red and blue,’ they say. Red for the blood dripping. Blue for the water. It is said that these two things are all the prisoners see. Usually they are attacked within one day. And yet, most still wish to take that chance. They prefer the false hope.” Eyes of red and blue, Kaladin thought, imagining the morbid picture. “You do a good work,” Sigzil said, rising, picking up his bowl. “At first, I hated you for lying to the men. But I have come to see that a false hope makes them happy. What you do is like giving medicine to a sick man to ease his pain until he dies. Now these men can spend their last days in laughter. You are a healer indeed, Kaladin Stormblessed.” Kaladin wanted to object, to say that it wasn’t a false hope, but he couldn’t. Not with his heart in his stomach. Not with what he knew. A moment later, Rock burst from the barrack. “I feel like a true alil’tiki’i again!” he proclaimed, holding aloft his razor. “My friends, you cannot know what you have done! Someday, I will take you to the Peaks and show you the hospitality of kings!” Despite all of his complaining, he hadn’t shaved his beard off completely. He had left long, red-blond sideburns, which curved down to his chin. The tip of the chin itself was shaved clean, as were his lips. On the tall, oval-faced
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man, the look was quite distinctive. “Ha!” Rock said, striding up to the fire. He grabbed the nearest men there and hugged them both to him, causing Bisig to nearly spill his stew. “I will make you all family for this. A peak dweller’s humaka’aban is his pride! I feel like a true man again. Here. This razor belongs not to me, but to us all. Any who wishes to use it must do so. Is my honor to share with you!” The men laughed, and a few took him up on the offer. Kaladin wasn’t one of them. It just…didn’t seem to matter to him. He accepted the bowl of stew Dunny brought him, but didn’t eat. Sigzil chose not to sit back down beside him, retreating to the other side of the campfire. Eyes of red and blue, Kaladin thought. I don’t know if that fits us. For him to have eyes of red and blue, Kaladin would have to believe that there was at least a small chance the bridge crew could survive. This night, Kaladin had trouble convincing himself. He’d never been an optimist. He saw the world as it was, or he tried to. That was a problem, though, when the truth he saw was so terrible. Oh, Stormfather, he thought, feeling the crushing weight of despair as he stared down at his bowl. I’m falling back to the wretch I was. I’m losing my grip on this, on myself. He couldn’t carry the hopes of all the bridgemen. He just wasn’t strong enough. FIVE AND A HALF YEARS AGO Kaladin pushed past the shrieking Laral and stumbled into the surgery room. Even after years working with his father, the amount of blood in the room was shocking. It was as if someone had dumped out a bucket of bright red paint. The scent of burned flesh hung in the air. Lirin worked frantically on Brightlord Rillir, Roshone’s son. An evil-looking, tusklike thing jutted from the young man’s abdomen, and his lower right leg was crushed. It hung by only a few tendons, splinters of bone poking out like reeds from the waters of a pond. Brightlord Roshone himself lay on the side table, groaning, eyes squeezed shut as he held his leg, which was pierced by another of the bony spears. Blood leaked from his improvised bandage, flowed down the side of the table, and dripped to the floor to mix with his son’s. Kaladin stood in the doorway gaping. Laral continued to scream. She clutched the doorframe as several of Roshone’s guards tried to pull her away. Her wails were frantic. “Do something! Work harder! He can’t! He was where it happened and I don’t care and let me go!” The garbled phrases degenerated into screeches. The guards finally got her away. “Kaladin!” his father snapped. “I need you!” Shocked into motion, Kaladin entered the room, scrubbing his hands then gathering bandages from the cabinet, stepping in blood. He caught a glimpse of Rillir’s face; much of the skin on the right side had been
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scraped off. The eyelid was gone, the blue eye itself sliced open at the front, deflated like the skin of a grape pressed for wine. Kaladin hastened to his father with the bandages. His mother appeared at the doorway a moment later, Tien behind her. She raised a hand to her mouth, then pulled Tien away. He stumbled, looking woozy. She returned in a moment without him. “Water, Kaladin!” Lirin cried. “Hesina, fetch more. Quickly!” His mother jumped to help, though she rarely assisted in the surgery anymore. Her hands shook as she grabbed one of the buckets and ran outside. Kaladin took the other bucket, which was full, to his father as Lirin eased the length of bone from the young lighteyes’s gut. Rillir’s remaining eye fluttered, head quivering. “What is that?” Kaladin asked, pressing the bandage to the wound as his father tossed the strange object aside. “Whitespine tusk,” his father said. “Water.” Kaladin grabbed a sponge, dunked it in the bucket, and used it to squeeze water into Rillir’s gut wound. That washed away the blood, giving Lirin a good look at the damage. He quested with his fingers as Kaladin got some needle and thread ready. There was already a tourniquet on the leg. Full amputation would come later. Lirin hesitated, fingers inside the gaping hole in Rillir’s belly. Kaladin cleaned the wound again. He looked up at his father, concerned. Lirin pulled his fingers out and walked to Brightlord Roshone. “Bandages, Kaladin,” he said curtly. Kaladin hurried over, though he shot a look over his shoulder at Rillir. The once-handsome young lighteyes trembled again, spasming. “Father…” “Bandages!” Lirin said. “What are you doing, surgeon?” Roshone bellowed. “What of my son?” Painspren swarmed around him. “Your son is dead,” Lirin said, yanking the tusk free from Roshone’s leg. The lighteyes bellowed in agony, though Kaladin couldn’t tell if that was because of the tusk or his son. Roshone clenched his jaw as Kaladin pressed the bandage down on his leg. Lirin dunked his hands in the water bucket, then quickly wiped them with knobweed sap to frighten off rotspren. “My son is not dead,” Roshone growled. “I can see him moving! Tend to him, surgeon.” “Kaladin, get the dazewater,” Lirin ordered gathering his sewing needle. Kaladin hurried to the back of the room, steps splashing blood, and threw open the far cupboard. He took out a small flask of clear liquid. “What are you doing?” Roshone bellowed, trying to sit up. “Look at my son! Almighty above, look at him!” Kaladin turned hesitantly, pausing as he poured dazewater on a bandage. Rillir was spasming more violently. “I work under three guidelines, Roshone,” Lirin said, forcibly pressing the lighteyes down against his table. “The guidelines every surgeon uses when choosing between two patients. If the wounds are equal, treat the youngest first.” “Then see to my son!” “If the wounds are not equally threatening,” Lirin continued, “treat the worst wound first.” “As I’ve been telling you!” “The third guideline supersedes them both, Roshone,” Lirin said, leaning down. “A surgeon
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must know when someone is beyond their ability to help. I’m sorry, Roshone. I would save him if I could, I promise you. But I cannot.” “No!” Roshone said, struggling again. “Kaladin! Quickly!” Lirin said. Kaladin dashed over. He pressed the bandage of dazewater to Roshone’s chin and mouth, just below the nose, forcing the lighteyed man to breathe the fumes. Kaladin held his own breath, as he’d been trained. Roshone bellowed and screamed, but the two of them held him down, and he was weak from blood loss. Soon, his bellows became softer. In seconds, he was speaking in gibberish and grinning to himself. Lirin turned back to the leg wound while Kaladin went to throw away the dazewater bandage. “No. Administer it to Rillir.” His father didn’t look away from his work. “It’s the only mercy we can give him.” Kaladin nodded and used the dazewater bandage on the wounded youth. Rillir’s breathing grew less frantic, though he didn’t seem conscious enough to notice the effects. Then Kaladin threw the bandage with the dazewater into the brazier; heat negated the effects. The white, puffy bandage wrinkled and browned in the fire, steam streaming off it as the edges burst into flame. Kaladin returned with the sponge and washed out Roshone’s wound as Lirin prodded at it. There were a few shards of tusk trapped inside, and Lirin muttered to himself, getting out his tongs and razor-sharp knife. “Damnation can take them all,” Lirin said, pulling out the first sliver of tusk. Behind him, Rillir fell still. “Isn’t sending half of us to war enough for them? Do they have to seek death even when they’re living in a quiet township? Roshone should never have gone looking for the storming whitespine.” “He was looking for it?” “They went hunting it,” Lirin spat. “Wistiow and I used to joke about lighteyes like them. If you can’t kill men, you kill beasts. Well, this is what you found, Roshone.” “Father,” Kaladin said softly. “He’s not going to be pleased with you when he awakes.” The brightlord was humming softly, lying back, eyes closed. Lirin didn’t respond. He yanked out another fragment of tusk, and Kaladin washed out the wound. His father pressed his fingers to the side of the large puncture, inspecting it. There was one more sliver of tusk, jutting from a muscle inside the wound. Right beside that muscle thumped the femoral artery, the largest in the leg. Lirin reached in with his knife, carefully cutting free the sliver of tusk. Then he paused for a moment, the edge of his blade just hairs from the artery. If that were cut… Kaladin thought. Roshone would be dead in minutes. He was only alive right now because the tusk had missed the artery. Lirin’s normally steady hand quivered. Then he glanced up at Kaladin. He withdrew the knife without touching the artery, then reached in with his tongs to pull the sliver free. He tossed it aside, then calmly reached for his thread and needle. Behind them, Rillir had stopped breathing. That
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evening, Kaladin sat on the steps to his house, hands in his lap. Roshone had been returned to his estate to be cared for by his personal servants. His son’s corpse was cooling in the crypt below, and a messenger had been sent to request a Soulcaster for the body. On the horizon, the sun was red as blood. Everywhere Kaladin looked, the world was red. The door to the surgery closed, and his father—looking as exhausted as Kaladin felt—tottered out. He eased himself down, sighing as he sat beside Kaladin, looking at the sun. Did it look like blood to him too? They didn’t speak as the sun slowly sank before them. Why was it most colorful when it was about to vanish for the night? Was it angry at being forced belong the horizon? Or was it a showman, giving a performance before retiring? Why was the most colorful part of people’s bodies—the brightness of their blood—hidden beneath the skin, never to be seen unless something went wrong? No, Kaladin thought. The blood isn’t the most colorful part of a body. The eyes can be colorful too. The blood and the eyes. Both representations of one’s heritage. And one’s nobility. “I saw inside a man today,” Kaladin finally said. “Not for the first time,” Lirin said, “and certainly not for the last. I’m proud of you. I expected to find you here crying, as you usually do when we lose a patient. You’re learning.” “When I said I saw inside a man,” Kaladin said, “I wasn’t talking about the wounds.” Lirin didn’t respond for a moment. “I see.” “You would have let him die if I hadn’t been there, wouldn’t you?” Silence. “Why didn’t you?” Kaladin said. “It would have solved so much!” “It wouldn’t have been letting him die. It would have been murdering him.” “You could have just let him bleed, then claimed you couldn’t save him. Nobody would have questioned you. You could have done it.” “No,” Lirin said, staring at the sunset. “No, I couldn’t have.” “But why?” “Because I’m not a killer, son.” Kaladin frowned. Lirin had a distant look in his eyes. “Somebody has to start. Somebody has to step forward and do what is right, because it is right. If nobody starts, then others cannot follow. The lighteyes do their best to kill themselves, and to kill us. The others still haven’t brought back Alds and Milp. Roshone just left them there.” Alds and Milp, two townsmen, had been on the hunt but hadn’t returned with the party bearing the two wounded lighteyes. Roshone had been so worried about Rillir that he’d left them behind so he could travel quickly. “The lighteyes don’t care about life,” Lirin said. “So I must. That’s another reason why I wouldn’t have let Roshone die, even if you hadn’t been there. Though looking at you did strengthen me.” “I wish it hadn’t,” Kaladin said. “You mustn’t say such things.” “Why not?” “Because, son. We have to be better than they are.” He sighed, standing. “You should sleep.
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I may need you when the others return with Alds and Milp.” That wasn’t likely; the two townsmen were probably dead by now. Their wounds were said to be pretty bad. Plus, the whitespines were still out there. Lirin went inside, but didn’t compel Kaladin to follow. Would I have let him die? Kaladin wondered. Maybe even flicked that knife to hasten him on his way? Roshone had been nothing but a blight since his arrival, but did that justify killing him? No. Cutting that artery wouldn’t have been justified. But what obligation had Kaladin to help? Withholding his aid wasn’t the same thing as killing. It just wasn’t. Kaladin thought it through a dozen different ways, pondering his father’s words. What he found shocked him. He honestly would have let Roshone die on that table. It would have been better for Kaladin’s family; it would have been better for the entire town. Kaladin’s father had once laughed at his son’s desire to go to war. Indeed, now that Kaladin had decided he would become a surgeon on his own terms, his thoughts and actions of earlier years felt childish to him. But Lirin thought Kaladin incapable of killing. You can hardly step on a cremling without feeling guilty, son, he’d said. Ramming your spear into a man would be nowhere near as easy as you seem to think. But his father was wrong. It was a stunning, frightening revelation. This wasn’t idle fancy or daydreaming about the glory of battle. This was real. At that moment, Kaladin knew he could kill, if he needed to. Some people—like a festering finger or a leg shattered beyond repair—just needed to be removed. “I’ve made my decision,” Shallan declared. Jasnah looked up from her research. In an unusual moment of deference, she put aside her books and sat with her back to the Veil, regarding Shallan. “Very well.” “What you did was both legal and right, in the strict sense of the words,” Shallan said. “But it was not moral, and it certainly wasn’t ethical.” “So morality and legality are distinct?” “Nearly all of the philosophies agree they are.” “But what do you think?” Shallan hesitated. “Yes. You can be moral without following the law, and you can be immoral while following the law.” “But you also said what I did was ‘right’ but not ‘moral.’ The distinction between those two seems less easy to define.” “An action can be right,” Shallan said. “It is simply something done, viewed without considering intent. Killing four men in self-defense is right.” “But not moral?” “Morality applies to your intent and the greater context of the situation. Seeking out men to kill is an immoral act, Jasnah, regardless of the eventual outcome.” Jasnah tapped her desktop with a fingernail. She was wearing her glove, the gemstones of the broken Soulcaster bulging beneath. It had been two weeks. Surely she’d discovered that it didn’t work. How could she be so calm? Was she trying to fix it in secret? Perhaps she feared that if she revealed it was
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broken, she would lose political power. Or had she realized that hers had been swapped for a different Soulcaster? Could it be, despite all odds, that Jasnah just hadn’t tried to use the Soulcaster? Shallan needed to leave before too long. But if she left before Jasnah discovered the swap, she risked having the woman try her Soulcaster just after Shallan vanished, bringing suspicion directly on her. The anxious waiting was driving Shallan near to madness. Finally, Jasnah nodded, then returned to her research. “You have nothing to say?” Shallan said. “I just accused you of murder.” “No,” Jasnah said, “murder is a legal definition. You said I killed unethically.” “You think I’m wrong, I assume?” “You are,” Jasnah said. “But I accept that you believe what you are saying and have put rational thought behind it. I have looked over your notes, and I believe you understand the various philosophies. In some cases, I think that you were quite insightful in your interpretation of them. The lesson was instructive.” She opened her book. “Then that’s it?” “Of course not,” Jasnah said. “We will study philosophy further in the future; for now, I’m satisfied that you have established a solid foundation in the topic.” “But I still decided you were wrong. I still think there’s an absolute Truth out there.” “Yes,” Jasnah said, “and it took you two weeks of struggling to come to that conclusion.” Jasnah looked up, meeting Shallan’s eyes. “It wasn’t easy, was it?” “No.” “And you still wonder, don’t you?” “Yes. “That is enough.” Jasnah narrowed her eyes slightly, a consoling smile appearing on her lips. “If it helps you wrestle with your feelings, child, understand that I was trying to do good. I sometimes wonder if I should accomplish more with my Soulcaster.” She turned back to her reading. “You are free for the rest of the day.” Shallan blinked. “What?” “Free,” Jasnah said. “You may go. Do as you please. You’ll spend it drawing beggars and barmaids, I suspect, but you may choose. Be off with you.” “Yes, Brightness! Thank you.” Jasnah waved in dismissal and Shallan grabbed her portfolio and hastened from the alcove. She hadn’t had any free time since the day she’d gone sketching on her own in the gardens. She’d been gently chided for that; Jasnah had left her in her rooms to rest, not go out sketching. Shallan waited impatiently as the parshman porters lowered her lift to the Veil’s groundfloor, then hurried out into the cavernous central hall. A long walk later, she approached the guest quarters, nodding to the master-servants who served there. Half guards, half concierges, they monitored who entered and left. She used her thick brass key to unlock the door to Jasnah’s rooms, then slipped inside and locked the door behind her. The small sitting chamber—furnished with a rug and two chairs beside the hearth—was lit by topazes. The table still contained a half-full cup of orange wine from Jasnah’s late research the night before, along with a few crumbs of bread on a plate. Shallan
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hurried to her own chamber, then shut the door and took the Soulcaster out of her safepouch. The warm glow of the gemstones bathed her face in white and red light. They were large enough—and therefore bright enough—that it was hard to look at them directly. Each would be worth ten or twenty broams. She’d been forced to hide them outside in the recent highstorm to infuse them, and that had been its own source of anxiety. She took a deep breath, then knelt and slid a small wooden stick from under the bed. A week and a half of practice, and she still hadn’t managed to make the Soulcaster do…well, anything at all. She’d tried tapping the gems, twisting them, shaking her hand, and flexing her hand in exact mimicry of Jasnah. She’d studied picture after picture she’d drawn of the process. She tried speaking, concentrating, and even begging. However, she’d found a book the day before that had offered what seemed like a useful tip. It claimed that humming, of all things, could make a Soulcasting more effective. It was just a passing reference, but it was more than she’d found anywhere else. She sat down on her bed and forced herself to concentrate. She closed her eyes, holding the stick, imagining it transforming into quartz. Then she began humming. Nothing happened. She kept on humming though, trying different notes, concentrating as hard as she could. She kept her attention on the task for a good half hour, but eventually her mind began to wander. A new worry began to nibble at her. Jasnah was one of the most brilliant, insightful scholars in the world. She’d put the Soulcaster out where it could be taken. Had she intentionally duped Shallan with a fake? It seemed an awful lot of trouble to go through. Why not just spring the trap and reveal Shallan as a thief? The fact that she couldn’t get the Soulcaster to work left her straining plausibility for explanations. She stopped humming and opened her eyes. The stick had not changed. So much for that tip, she thought, setting the stick aside with a sigh. She’d been so hopeful. She lay back on the bed, resting, staring up at the brown stone ceiling, cut—like the rest of the Conclave—directly out of the mountain. Here, the stone had been left intentionally rough, evoking the roof of a cave. It was quite beautiful in a subtle way she’d never noticed before, the colors and contours of the rock rippling like a disturbed pond. She took a sheet from her portfolio and began to sketch the rock patterns. One sketch to calm her, and then she would get back to the Soulcaster. Perhaps she should try it on her other hand again. She couldn’t capture the colors of the strata, not in charcoal, but she could record the fascinating way the strata wove together. Like a work of art. Had some stoneworker cut this ceiling intentionally, crafting this subtle creation, or was it an accident of nature? She smiled, imagining some
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overworked stonecutter noticing the beautiful grain of the rock and deciding to form a wave pattern for his own personal wonder and sense of beauty. “What are you?” Shallan yelped, sitting up, sketchpad bouncing free of her lap. Someone had whispered those words. She’d heard them distinctly! “Who is there?” she asked. Silence. “Who’s there!” she said more loudly, her heart beating quickly. Something sounded outside her door, from the sitting room. Shallan jumped, hiding the hand wearing the Soulcaster under a pillow as the door creaked open, revealing a wizened palace maid, darkeyed and dressed in a white and black uniform. “Oh dear!” the woman exclaimed. “I had no idea you were here, Brightness.” She bowed low. A palace maid. Here to clean the room, an everyday occurrence. Focused on her meditation, Shallan hadn’t heard her enter. “Why did you speak to me?” “Speak to you, Brightness?” “You…” No, the voice had been a whisper, and it had quite distinctly come from inside Shallan’s room. It couldn’t have been the maid. She shivered and glanced about. But that was foolish. The tiny room was easily inspected. There were no Voidbringers hiding in the corners or under her bed. What, then, had she heard? Noises from the woman cleaning, obviously. Shallan’s mind had just interpreted those random sounds as words. Forcing herself to relax, Shallan looked out past the maid into the sitting room. The woman had cleaned up the wineglass and crumbs. A broom leaned against the wall. In addition, Jasnah’s door was cracked open. “Were you in Brightness Jasnah’s room?” Shallan demanded. “Yes, Brightness,” the woman said. “Tidying up the desk, making the bed—” “Brightness Jasnah does not like people entering her room. The maids have been told not to clean in there.” The king had promised that his maids were very carefully chosen, and there had never been issues of theft, but Jasnah still insisted that none enter her bedchamber. The woman paled. “I’m sorry, Brightness. I didn’t hear! I wasn’t told—” “Hush, it’s all right,” Shallan said. “You’ll want to go tell her what you’ve done. She always notices if her things were moved. It will be better for you if you go to her and explain.” “Y-Yes, Brightness.” The woman bowed again. “In fact,” Shallan said, something occurring to her. “You should go now. No point putting it off.” The elderly maid sighed. “Yes, of course, Brightness.” She withdrew. A few seconds later, the outside door closed and locked. Shallan leapt up, pulling off the Soulcaster and stuffing it back in her safepouch. She hurried outside, heart thumping, the strange voice forgotten as she seized the opportunity to look into Jasnah’s room. It was unlikely that Shallan would discover anything useful about the Soulcaster, but she couldn’t pass up the chance—not with the maid to blame for moving things. She felt only a glimmer of guilt for this. She’d already stolen from Jasnah. Compared with that, poking through her room was nothing. The bedroom was larger than Shallan’s, though it still felt cramped because of the unavoidable
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lack of windows. Jasnah’s bed, a four-poster monstrosity, took up half the space. The vanity was against the far wall, and beside it the dressing table from which Shallan had originally stolen the Soulcaster. Other than a dresser, the only other thing in the room was the desk, books piled high on the left side. Shallan never got a chance to look at Jasnah’s notebooks. Might she, perhaps, have taken notes on the Soulcaster? Shallan sat at the desk, hurriedly pulling open the top drawer and poking through the brushpens, charcoal pencils, and sheets of paper. All were organized neatly, and the paper was blank. The bottom right drawer held ink and empty notebooks. The bottom left drawer had a small collection of reference books. That left the books on the top of the table. Jasnah would have the majority of her notebooks with her as she worked. But…yes, there were still a few here. Heart fluttering, Shallan gathered up the three thin volumes and set them before her. Notes on Urithiru, the first one declared inside. The notebook was full—it appeared—of quotes from and notations about various books Jasnah had found. All spoke of this place, Urithiru. Jasnah had mentioned it earlier to Kabsal. Shallan put that book aside, looking at the next, hoping for mention of the Soulcaster. This notebook was also filled to capacity, but there was no title on it. Shallan picked through, reading some entries. “The ones of ash and fire, who killed like a swarm, relentless before the Heralds…” Noted in Masly, page 337. Corroborated by Coldwin and Hasavah. “They take away the light, wherever they lurk. Skin that is burned.” Cormshen, page 104. Innia, in her recordings of children’s folktales, speaks of the Voidbringers as being “Like a highstorm, regular in their coming, yet always unexpected.” The word Desolation is used twice in reference to their appearances. See pages 57, 59, and 64 of Tales by Hearthlight. “They changed, even as we fought them. Like shadows they were, that can transform as the flame dances. Never underestimate them because of what you first see.” Purports to be a scrap collected from Talatin, a Radiant of the Order of Stonewards. The source—Guvlow’s Incarnate—is generally held as reliable, though this is from a copied fragment of The Poem of the Seventh Morning, which has been lost. They went on like that. Pages and pages. Jasnah had trained her in this method of note taking—once the notebook was filled, each item would be evaluated again for reliability and usefulness and copied to different, more specific notebooks. Frowning, Shallan looked through the final notebook. It focused on Natanatan, the Unclaimed Hills, and the Shattered Plains. It collected records of discoveries by hunters, explorers, or tradesmen searching for a river passage to New Natanan. Of the three notebooks, the largest was the one that focused on the Voidbringers. The Voidbringers again. Many people in more rural places whispered of them and other monsters of the dark. The raspings, or stormwhispers, or even the dreaded nightspren. Shallan had been taught by
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stern tutors that these were superstition, fabrications of the Lost Radiants, who used tales of monsters to justify their domination of mankind. The ardents taught something else. They spoke of the Lost Radiants—called the Knights Radiant then—fighting off Voidbringers during the war to hold Roshar. According to these teachings, it was only after defeating the Voidbringers—and the departure of the Heralds—that the Radiants had fallen. Both groups agreed that the Voidbringers were gone. Fabrications or long-defeated enemies, the result was the same. Shallan could believe that some people—some scholars, even—might believe that the Voidbringers still existed, haunting mankind. But Jasnah the skeptic? Jasnah, who denied the existence of the Almighty? Could the woman really be so twisted as to deny the existence of God, but accept the existence of his mythological enemies? A knock came at the outer door. Shallan jumped, raising her hand to her breast. She hurriedly replaced the notebooks on the desk in the same order and orientation. Then, flustered, she hurried out to the door. Jasnah wouldn’t knock, you silly fool, she told herself, unlocking and opening the door a crack. Kabsal stood outside. The handsome, lighteyed ardent held up a basket. “I’ve heard reports that you have the day free.” He shook the basket temptingly. “Would you like some jam?” Shallan calmed herself, then glanced back at Jasnah’s open quarters. She really should investigate more. She turned to Kabsal, meaning to tell him no, but his eyes were so inviting. That hint of a smile on his face, that good-natured and relaxed posture. If Shallan went with Kabsal, maybe she could ask him what he knew regarding Soulcasters. That wasn’t what decided it for her, however, The truth was, she needed to relax. She’d been so on edge lately, brain stuffed with philosophy, every spare moment spent trying to make the Soulcaster work. Was it any wonder she was hearing voices? “I’d love some jam,” she declared. “Truthberry jam,” Kabsal said, holding up the small green jar. “It’s Azish. Legends there say that those who consume the berries speak only the truth until the next sunset.” Shallan raised an eyebrow. They were seated on cushions atop a blanket in the Conclave gardens, not far from where she’d first experimented with the Soulcaster. “And is it true?” “Hardly,” Kabsal said, opening the jar. “The berries are harmless. But the leaves and stalks of the truthberry plant, if burned, give off a smoke that makes people intoxicated and euphoric. It appears that peoples often gathered the stalks for making fires. They’d eat the berries around the campfire and have a rather…interesting night.” “It’s a wonder—” Shallan began, then bit her lip. “What?” he prodded. She sighed. “It’s a wonder they didn’t become known as birthberries, considering—” She blushed. He laughed. “That’s a good point!” “Stormfather,” she said, blushing further. “I’m terrible at being proper. Here, give me some of that jam.” He smiled, handing over a slice of bread with green jam slathered across the top. A dull-eyed parshman—appropriated from inside the Conclave—sat on the ground beside a shalebark
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wall, acting as an impromptu chaperone. It felt so strange to be out with a man near her own age with only a single parshman in attendance. It felt liberating. Exhilarating. Or maybe that was just the sunlight and the open air. “I’m also terrible at being scholarly,” she said, closing her eyes, breathing deeply. “I like it outside far too much.” “Many of the greatest scholars spent their lives traveling.” “And for each one of them,” Shallan said, “there were a hundred more stuck back in a hole of a library, buried in books.” “And they wouldn’t have had it any other way. Most people with a bent for research prefer their holes and libraries. But you do not. That makes you intriguing.” She opened her eyes, smiling at him, then took a luscious bite of her jam and bread. This Thaylen bread was so fluffy, it was more like cake. “So,” she said as he chewed on his bite, “do you feel any more truthful, now that you’ve had the jam?” “I am an ardent,” he said. “It is my duty and calling to be truthful at all times.” “Of course,” she said. “I’m always truthful as well. So full of truth, in fact, that sometimes it squeezes the lies right out my lips. There isn’t a place for them inside, you see.” He laughed heartily. “Shallan Davar. I can’t imagine anyone as sweet as yourself uttering a single untruth.” “Then for the sake of your sanity, I’ll keep them coming in pairs.” She smiled. “I’m having a terrible time, and this food is awful.” “You’ve just disproven an entire body of lore and mythology surrounding the eating of truthberry jam!” “Good,” Shallan said. “Jam should not have lore or mythology. It should be sweet, colorful, and delicious.” “Like young ladies, I presume.” “Brother Kabsal!” She blushed again. “That wasn’t at all appropriate.” “And yet you smile.” “I can’t help it,” she said. “I’m sweet, colorful, and delicious.” “You have the colorful part right,” he said, obviously amused at her deep blush. “And the sweet part. Can’t speak for your deliciousness….” “Kabsal!” she exclaimed, though she wasn’t entirely shocked. She’d once told herself that he was interested in her only in order to protect her soul, but that was getting more and more difficult to believe. He stopped by at least once a week. He chuckled at her embarrassment, but that only made her blush further. “Stop it!” She held her hand up in front of her eyes. “My face must be the color of my hair! You shouldn’t say such things; you’re a man of religion.” “But still a man, Shallan.” “One who said his interest in me was only academic.” “Yes, academic,” he said idly. “Involving many experiments and much firsthand field research.” “Kabsal!” He laughed deeply, taking a bite of his bread. “I’m sorry, Brightness Shallan. But it gets such a reaction!” She grumbled, lowering her hand, but knew that he said the things—in part—because she encouraged him. She couldn’t help it. Nobody had ever shown her
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the kind of interest that he, increasingly, did. She liked him—liked talking with him, liked listening to him. It was a wonderful way to break the monotony of study. There was, of course, no prospect for a union. Assuming she could protect her family, she’d be needed to make a good political marriage. Dallying with an ardent owned by the king of Kharbranth wouldn’t serve anyone. I’ll soon have to start hinting to him the truth, she thought. He has to know that this won’t go anywhere. Doesn’t he? He leaned toward her. “You really are what you seem, aren’t you, Shallan?” “Capable? Intelligent? Charming?” He smiled. “Genuine.” “I wouldn’t say that,” she said. “You are. I see it in you.” “It’s not that I’m genuine. I’m naive. I lived my entire childhood in my family’s manor.” “You don’t have the air of a recluse about you. You’re so at ease at conversation.” “I had to become so. I spent most of my childhood in my own company, and I detest boring conversation partners.” He smiled, though his eyes held concern. “It seems a shame that one such as you would lack for attention. That’s like hanging a beautiful painting facing the wall.” She leaned back on her safehand, finishing off her bread. “I wouldn’t say I lacked for attention, not quantitatively, for certain. My father paid me plenty of attention.” “I’ve heard of him. A stern man, by reputation.” “He’s…” She had to pretend he was still alive. “My father is a man of passion and virtue. Just never at the same time.” “Shallan! That might just be the wittiest thing I’ve heard you say.” “And perhaps the most truthful. Unfortunately.” Kabsal looked into her eyes, searching for something. What did he see? “You don’t seem to care for your father much.” “Another truthful statement. The berries are working on both of us, I see.” “He’s a hurtful man, I gather?” “Yes, though never to me. I’m too precious. His ideal, perfect daughter. You see, my father is precisely the type of man to hang a picture facing the wrong way. That way, it can’t be soiled by unworthy eyes or touched by unworthy fingers.” “That’s a shame. As you look very touchable to me.” She glared. “I told you, no more of that teasing.” “That wasn’t teasing,” he said, regarding her with deep blue eyes. Earnest eyes. “You intrigue me, Shallan Davar.” She found her heart thumping. Oddly, a panic rose within her at the same time. “I shouldn’t be intriguing.” “Why not?” “Logic puzzles are intriguing. Mathematical computations can be intriguing. Political maneuvers are intriguing. But women…they should be nothing short of baffling.” “And what if I think I’m beginning to understand you?” “Then I’m at a severe disadvantage,” she said. “As I don’t understand myself.” He smiled. “We shouldn’t be talking like this, Kabsal. You’re an ardent.” “A man can leave the ardentia, Shallan.” She felt a jolt. He looked steadily at her, not blinking. Handsome, soft-spoken, witty. This could grow very dangerous very quickly, she thought. “Jasnah
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thinks you’re getting close to me because you want her Soulcaster,” Shallan blurted out. Then she winced. Idiot! That’s your response when a man hints that he might leave the service of the Almighty in order to be with you? “Brightness Jasnah is quite clever,” Kabsal said, slicing himself another piece of bread. Shallan blinked. “Oh, er. You mean she’s right?” “Right and wrong,” Kabsal said. “The devotary would very, very much like to get that fabrial. I planned to ask your help eventually.” “But?” “But my superiors thought it was a terrible idea.” He grimaced. “They think the king of Alethkar is volatile enough that he’d march to war with Kharbranth over that. Soulcasters aren’t Shardblades, but they can be equally important.” He shook his head, taking a bite of bread. “Elhokar Kholin should be ashamed to let his sister use that fabrial, particularly so trivially. But if we were to steal it…Well, the repercussions could be felt across all of Vorin Roshar.” “Is that so?” Shallan said, feeling sick. He nodded. “Most people don’t think about it. I didn’t. Kings rule and war with Shards—but their armies subsist through Soulcasters. Do you have any idea the kinds of supply lines and support personnel Soulcasters replace? Without them, warfare is virtually impossible. You’d need hundreds of wagons filled with food every month!” “I guess…that would be a problem.” She took a deep breath. “They fascinate me, these Soulcasters. I’ve always wondered what it would feel like to use one.” “I as well.” “So you’ve never used one?” He shook his head. “There aren’t any in Kharbranth.” Right, she thought. Of course. That’s why the king needed Jasnah to help his granddaughter. “Have you ever heard anyone talk about using one?” She cringed at the bold statement. Would it make him suspicious? He just nodded idly. “There’s a secret to it, Shallan.” “Really?” she asked, heart in her throat. He looked up at her, seeming conspiratorial. “It’s really not that difficult.” “It…What?” “It’s true,” he said. “I’ve heard it from several ardents. There’s so much shadow and ritual surrounding Soulcasters. They’re kept mysterious, aren’t used where people can see. But the truth is, there’s not much to them. You just put one on, press your hand against something, and tap a gemstone with your finger. It works that simply.” “That’s not how Jasnah does it,” she said, perhaps too defensively. “Yes, that confused me, but supposedly if you use one long enough, you learn how to control them better.” He shook his head. “I don’t like the mystery that has grown up around them. It smells too much like the mysticism of the old Hierocracy. We’d better not find ourselves treading down that path again. What would it matter if people knew how simple the Soulcasters are to use? The principles and gifts of the Almighty are often simple.” Shallan barely listened to that last part. Unfortunately, it seemed that Kabsal was as ignorant as she. More ignorant, even. She’d tried the exact method he spoke of, and it didn’t work. Perhaps
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the ardents he knew were lying to protect the secret. “Anyway,” Kabsal said, “I guess that’s a tangent. You asked me about stealing the Soulcaster, and rest assured, I wouldn’t put you in that position. I was foolish to think of it, and I was shortly forbidden to attempt it. I was ordered to care for your soul and see that you weren’t corrupted by Jasnah’s teachings, and perhaps try to reclaim Jasnah’s soul as well.” “Well, that last one is going to be difficult.” “I hadn’t noticed,” he replied dryly. She smiled, though she couldn’t quite decide how to feel. “I kind of killed the moment, didn’t I? Between us?” “I’m glad you did,” he said, dusting off his hands. “I get carried away, Shallan. At times, I wonder if I’m as bad at being an ardent as you are at being proper. I don’t want to be presumptuous. It’s just that the way you speak, it gets my mind churning, and my tongue starts saying whatever comes to it.” “And so…” “And so we should call it a day,” Kabsal said, standing. “I need time to think.” Shallan stood as well, holding out her freehand for his assistance; standing up in a sleek Vorin dress was difficult. They were in a section of the gardens where the shalebark wasn’t quite so high, so once standing, Shallan could see that the king himself was passing nearby, chatting with a middle-aged ardent who had a long, narrow face. The king often went strolling through the gardens on his midday walk. She waved to him, but the kindly man didn’t see her. He was deep in conversation with the ardent. Kabsal turned, noticed the king, then ducked down. “What?” Shallan said. “The king keeps careful track of his ardents. He and Brother Ixil think I’m on cataloging duty today.” She found herself smiling. “You’re scrapping your day’s work to go on a picnic with me?” “Yes.” “I thought you were supposed to spend time with me,” she said, folding her arms. “To protect my soul.” “I was. But there are those among the ardents who worry that I’m a little too interested in you.” “They’re right.” “I’ll come see you tomorrow,” he said, peeking up over the top of the shalebark. “Assuming I’m not stuck in indexing all day as a punishment.” He smiled at her. “If I decide to leave the ardentia, that is my choice, and they cannot forbid it—though they may try to distract me.” He scrambled away as she prepared herself to tell him that he was presuming too much. She couldn’t get the words out. Perhaps because she was growing less and less certain what she wanted. Shouldn’t she be focused on helping her family? By now, Jasnah likely had discovered that her Soulcaster didn’t work, but saw no advantage in revealing it. Shallan should leave. She could go to Jasnah and use the terrible experience in the alleyway as an excuse to quit. And yet, she was terribly reluctant. Kabsal was part of that, but he wasn’t
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the main reason. The truth was that, despite her occasional complaints, she loved learning to be a scholar. Even after Jasnah’s philosophical training, even after spending days reading book after book. Even with the confusion and the stress, Shallan often felt fulfilled in a way she’d never been before. Yes, Jasnah had been wrong to kill those men, but Shallan wanted to know enough about philosophy to cite the correct reasons why. Yes, digging through historical records could be tedious, but Shallan appreciated the skills and patience she was learning; they were sure to be of value when she got to do her own deep research in the future. Days spent learning, lunches spent laughing with Kabsal, evenings chatting and debating with Jasnah. That was what she wanted. And those were the parts of her life that were complete lies. Troubled, she picked up the basket of bread and jam, then made her way back to the Conclave and Jasnah’s suite. An envelope addressed to her sat in the waiting bin. Shallan frowned, breaking the seal to look inside. Lass, it read. We got your message. The Wind’s Pleasure will soon be at port in Kharbranth again. Of course we’ll give you passage and return to your estates. It would be my pleasure to have you aboard. We are Davar men, we are. Indebted to your family. We’re making a quick trip over to the mainland, but will hurry to Kharbranth next. Expect us in one week’s time to pick you up. —Captain Tozbek The undertext, written by Tozbek’s wife, read even more clearly. We’d happily give you free passage, Brightness, if you’re willing to do some scribing for us during the trip. The ledgers badly need to be rewritten. Shallan stared at the note for a long time. She’d wanted to know where he was and when he was planning to return, but he’d apparently taken her letter as a request to come and pick her up. It seemed a fitting deadline. That would put her departure at three weeks after stealing the Soulcaster, as she’d told Nan Balat to expect. If Jasnah hadn’t reacted to the Soulcaster switch by then, Shallan would have to take it to mean that she wasn’t under suspicion. One week. She would be on that ship. It made her break inside to realize it, but it had to be done. She lowered the paper and left the guest hallway, her steps taking her through the twisting corridors into the Veil. Shortly, she stood outside Jasnah’s alcove. The princess sat at her desk, reed scratching at a notebook. She glanced up. “I thought I told you that you could do whatever you want today.” “You did,” Shallan said. “And I realized that what I want to do is study.” Jasnah smiled in a sly, understanding way. Almost a self-satisfied way. If she only knew. “Well, I’m not going to chide you for that,” Jasnah said, turning back to her research. Shallan sat, offering the bread and jam to Jasnah, who shook her head and continued researching.
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Shallan cut herself another slice and topped it with jam. Then she opened a book and sighed in satisfaction. In one week, she’d have to leave. But in the meantime, she would let herself pretend a little while longer. Kaladin awoke to a familiar feeling of dread. He’d spent much of the night lying awake on the hard floor, staring up into the dark, thinking. Why try? Why care? There is no hope for these men. He felt like a wanderer seeking desperately for a pathway into the city to escape wild beasts. But the city was atop a steep mountain, and no matter how he approached, the climb was always the same. Impossible. A hundred different paths. The same result. Surviving his punishment would not save his men. Training them to run faster would not save them. They were bait. The efficiency of the bait did not change its purpose or its fate. Kaladin forced himself to his feet. He felt ground down, like a millstone used far too long. He still didn’t understand how he’d survived. Did you preserve me, Almighty? Save me so that I could watch them die? You were supposed to burn prayers to send them to the Almighty, who waited for his Heralds to recapture the Tranquiline Halls. That had never made sense to Kaladin. The Almighty was supposed to be able to see all and know all. So why did he need a prayer burned before he would do anything? Why did he need people to fight for him in the first place? Kaladin left the barrack, stepping into the light. Then he froze. The men were lined up, waiting. A ragged bunch of bridgemen, wearing brown leather vests and short trousers that only reached their knees. Dirty shirts, sleeves rolled to the elbows, lacing down the front. Dusty skin, mops of ragged hair. And yet now, because of Rock’s gift, they all had neatly trimmed beards or clean-shaven faces. Everything else about them was worn. But their faces were clean. Kaladin raised a hesitant hand to his face, touching his unkempt black beard. The men seemed to be waiting for something. “What?” he asked. The men shifted uncomfortably, glancing toward the lumberyard. They were waiting for him to lead them in practice, of course. But practice was futile. He opened his mouth to tell them that, but hesitated as he saw something approaching. Four men, carrying a palanquin. A tall, thin man in a violet lighteyes’s coat walked beside it. The men turned to look. “What’s this?” Hobber asked, scratching at his thick neck. “It will be Lamaril’s replacement,” Kaladin said, gently pushing his way through the line of bridgemen. Syl flitted down and landed on his shoulder as the palanquin bearers stopped before Kaladin and turned to the side, revealing a dark-haired woman wearing a sleek violet dress decorated with golden glyphs. She lounged on her side, resting on a cushioned couch, her eyes a pale blue. “I am Brightness Hashal,” she said, voice lightly touched by a Kholinar accent. “My husband, Brightlord
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Matal, is your new captain.” Kaladin held his tongue, biting back a remark. He had some experience with lighteyes who got “promoted” to positions like this one. Matal himself said nothing, simply standing with his hand resting on the hilt of his sword. He was tall—nearly as tall as Kaladin—but spindly. Delicate hands. That sword hadn’t seen much practice. “We have been advised,” Hashal said, “that this crew has been troublesome.” Her eyes narrowed, focusing on Kaladin. “It seems that you have survived the Almighty’s judgment. I bear a message for you from your betters. The Almighty has given you another chance to prove yourself as a bridgeman. That is all. Many are trying to read too much into what happened, so Highprince Sadeas has forbidden gawkers to come see you. “My husband does not intend to run the bridge crews with his predecessor’s laxness. My husband is a well-respected and honored associate of Highprince Sadeas himself, not some near-darkeyed mongrel like Lamaril.” “Is that so?” Kaladin said. “Then how did he end up in this latrine pit of a job?” Hashal didn’t display a hint of anger at the comment. She flicked her fingers to the side, and one of the soldiers stepped forward and rammed the butt of his spear toward Kaladin’s stomach. Kaladin caught it, old reflexes still too keen. Possibilities flashed through his mind, and he could see the fight before it took place. Yank on the spear, throw the soldier off guard. Step forward and ram an elbow into his forearm, making him drop the weapon. Take control, spin the spear up and slam the soldier on the side of the head. Spin into a sweep to drop the two who came to help their companion. Raise the spear for the— No. That would only get Kaladin killed. Kaladin released the butt of the spear. The soldier blinked in surprise that a mere bridgeman had blocked his blow. Scowling, the soldier jerked the butt up and slammed it into the side of Kaladin’s head. Kaladin let it hit him, rolling with it, allowing it to toss him to the ground. His head rang from the shock, but his eyesight stopped spinning after a moment. He’d have a headache, but probably no concussion. He took in a few deep breaths, lying on the ground, hands forming fists. His fingers seemed to burn where he had touched the spear. The soldier stepped back into position beside the palanquin. “No laxness,” Hashal said calmly. “If you must know, my husband requested this assignment. The bridge crews are essential to Brightlord Sadeas’s advantage in the War of Reckoning. Their mismanagement under Lamaril was disgraceful.” Rock knelt down, helping Kaladin to his feet while scowling at the lighteyes and their soldiers. Kaladin stumbled up, holding his hand to the side of his head. His fingers felt slick and wet, and a trickle of warm blood ran down his neck to his shoulder. “From now on,” Hashal said, “aside from doing normal bridge duty, each crew will be assigned only one type of
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work duty. Gaz!” The short bridge sergeant poked out from behind the palanquin. Kaladin hadn’t noticed him there, behind the porters and the soldiers. “Yes, Brightness?” Gaz bowed several times. “My husband wishes Bridge Four to be assigned chasm duty permanently. Whenever they are not needed for bridge duty, I want them working in those chasms. This will be far more efficient. They will know which sections have been scoured recently, and will not cover the same ground. You see? Efficiency. They will start immediately.” She rapped on the side of her palanquin, and the porters turned, bearing her away. Her husband continued to walk alongside her without saying a word, and Gaz hurried to keep up. Kaladin stared after them, holding his hand to his head. Dunny ran and fetched him a bandage. “Chasm duty,” Moash grumbled. “Great job, lordling. She’d see us dead from a chasmfiend if the Parshendi arrows don’t take us.” “What are we going to do?” asked lean, balding Peet, his voice edged with worry. “We get to work,” Kaladin said, taking the bandage from Dunny. He walked away, leaving them in a frightened clump. A short time later, Kaladin stood at the edge of the chasm, looking down. The hot light of the noon sun burned the back of his neck and cast his shadow downward into the rift, to join with those below. I could fly, he thought. Step off and fall, wind blowing against me. Fly for a few moments. A few, beautiful moments. He knelt and grabbed the rope ladder, then climbed down into the darkness. The other bridgemen followed in a silent group. They’d been infected by his mood. Kaladin knew what was happening to him. Step by step, he was turning back into the wretch he had been. He’d always known it was a danger. He’d clung to the bridgemen as a lifeline. But he was letting go now. As he stepped down the rungs, a faint translucent figure of blue and white dropped beside him, sitting on a swinglike seat. Its ropes disappeared a few inches above Syl’s head. “What is wrong with you?” she asked softly. Kaladin just kept climbing down. “You should be happy. You survived the storms. The other bridgemen were so excited.” “I itched to fight that soldier,” Kaladin whispered. Syl cocked her head. “I could have beaten him,” Kaladin continued. “I probably could have beaten all four of them. I’ve always been good with the spear. No, not good. Durk called me amazing. A natural born soldier, an artist with the spear.” “Maybe you should have fought them, then.” “I thought you didn’t like killing.” “I hate it,” she said, growing more translucent. “But I’ve helped men kill before.” Kaladin froze on the ladder. “What?” “It’s true,” she said. “I can remember it, just faintly.” “How?” “I don’t know.” She grew paler. “I don’t want to talk about it. But it was right to do. I feel it.” Kaladin hung for a moment longer. Teft called down, asking if something was wrong. He started to
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descend again. “I didn’t fight the soldiers today,” Kaladin said, eyes toward the chasm wall, “because it wouldn’t work. My father told me that it is impossible to protect by killing. Well, he was wrong.” “But—” “He was wrong,” Kaladin said, “because he implied that you could protect people in other ways. You can’t. This world wants them dead, and trying to save them is pointless.” He reached the bottom of the chasm, stepping into darkness. Teft reached the bottom next and lit his torch, bathing the moss-covered stone walls in flickering orange light. “Is that why you didn’t accept it?” Syl whispered, flitting over and landing on Kaladin’s shoulder. “The glory. All those months ago?” Kaladin shook his head. “No. That was something else.” “What did you say, Kaladin?” Teft raised the torch. The aging bridgeman’s face looked older than usual in the flickering light, the shadows it created emphasizing the furrows in his skin. “Nothing, Teft,” Kaladin said. “Nothing important.” Syl sniffed at that. Kaladin ignored her, lighting his torch from Teft’s as the other bridgemen arrived. When they were all down, Kaladin led the way out into the dark rift. The pale sky seemed distant here, like a far-off scream. This place was a tomb, with rotting wood and stagnant pools of water, good only for growing cremling larvae. The bridgemen clustered together unconsciously as they always did in this fell place. Kaladin walked in front, and Syl fell silent. He gave Teft the chalk to mark directions, and didn’t pause to pick up salvage. But neither did he walk too quickly. The other bridgemen were hushed behind them, speaking in occasional whispers too low to echo. As if their words were strangled by the gloom. Rock eventually moved up to walk beside Kaladin. “Is difficult job, we have been given. But we are bridgemen! Life, it is difficult, eh? Is nothing new. We must have plan. How do we fight next?” “There is no next fight, Rock.” “But we have won grand victory! Look, not days ago, you were delirious. You should have died. I know this thing. But instead, you walk, strong as any other man. Ha! Stronger. Is miracle. The Uli’tekanaki guide you.” “It’s not a miracle, Rock,” Kaladin said. “It’s more of a curse.” “How is that a curse, my friend?” Rock asked, chuckling. He jumped up and into a puddle and laughed louder as it splashed Teft, who was walking just behind. The large Horneater could be remarkably childlike at times. “Living, this thing is no curse!” “It is if it brings me back to watch you all die,” Kaladin said. “Better I shouldn’t have survived that storm. I’m just going to end up dead from a Parshendi arrow. We all are.” Rock looked troubled. When Kaladin offered nothing more, he withdrew. They continued, uncomfortably passing sections of scarred wall where chasmfiends had left their marks. Eventually they stumbled across a heap of bodies deposited by the highstorms. Kaladin stopped, holding up his torch, the other bridgemen peeking around him. Some fifty people had
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been washed into a recess in the rock, a small dead-end side passage in the stone. The bodies were piled there, a wall of the dead, arms hanging out, reeds and flotsam stuck between them. Kaladin saw at a glance that the corpses were old enough to begin bloating and rotting. Behind him, one of the men retched, which caused a few of the others to do so as well. The scent was terrible, the corpses slashed and ripped into by cremlings and larger carrion beasts, many of which scuttled away from the light. A disembodied hand lay nearby, and a trail of blood led away. There were also fresh scrapes in the lichen as high as fifteen feet up the wall. A chasmfiend had ripped one of the bodies loose to devour. It might come back for the others. Kaladin didn’t retch. He shoved his half-burned torch between two large stones, then got to work, pulling bodies from the pile. At least they weren’t rotted enough to come apart. The bridgemen slowly filled in around him, working. Kaladin let his mind grow numb, not thinking. Once the bodies were down, the bridgemen laid them in a line. Then they began pulling off their armor, searching their pockets, taking knives from belts. Kaladin left gathering the spears to the others, working by himself off to the side. Teft knelt beside Kaladin, rolling over a body with a head smashed by the fall. The shorter man began to undo the straps on the fallen man’s breastplate. “Do you want to talk?” Kaladin didn’t say anything. He just kept working. Don’t think about the future. Don’t think about what will happen. Just survive. Don’t care, but don’t despair. Just be. “Kaladin.” Teft’s voice was like a knife, digging into Kaladin’s shell, making him squirm. “If I wanted to talk,” Kaladin grumbled, “would I be working here by myself?” “Fair enough,” Teft said. He finally got the breastplate strap undone. “The other men are confused, son. They want to know what we’re going to do next.” Kaladin sighed, then stood, turning to look at the bridgemen. “I don’t know what to do! If we try to protect ourselves, Sadeas will have us punished! We’re bait, and we’re going to die. There’s nothing I can do about it! It’s hopeless.” The bridgemen regarded him with shock. Kaladin turned from them and went back to work, kneeling beside Teft. “There,” he said. “I explained it to them.” “Idiot,” Teft said under his breath. “After all you’ve done, you’re abandoning us now?” To the side, the bridgemen turned back to work. Kaladin caught a few of them grumbling. “Bastard,” Moash said. “I said this would happen.” “Abandoning you?” Kaladin hissed to Teft. Just let me be. Let me go back to apathy. At least then there’s no pain. “Teft, I’ve spent hours and hours trying to find a way out, but there isn’t one! Sadeas wants us dead. Lighteyes get what they want; that’s the way the world works.” “So?” Kaladin ignored him, turning back to his work,
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pulling at the boot on a soldier whose fibula looked to have been shattered in three different places. That made it storming awkward to get the boot off. “Well, maybe we will die,” Teft said. “But maybe this isn’t about surviving.” Why was Teft—of all people—trying to cheer him up? “If survival isn’t the point, Teft, then what is?” Kaladin finally got the boot off. He turned to the next body in line, then froze. It was a bridgeman. Kaladin didn’t recognize him, but that vest and those sandals were unmistakable. He lay slumped against the wall, arms at his sides, mouth slightly open and eyelids sunken. The skin on one of the hands had slipped free and pulled away. “I don’t know what the point is,” Teft grumbled. “But it seems pathetic to give up. We should keep fighting. Right until those arrows take us. You know, ‘journey before destination.’” “What does that mean?” “I don’t know,” Teft said, looking down quickly. “Just something I heard once.” “It’s something the Lost Radiants used to say,” Sigzil said, walking past. Kaladin glanced to the side. The soft-spoken Azish man set a shield on a pile. He looked up, brown skin dark in the torchlight. “It was their motto. Part of it, at least. ‘Life before death. Strength before weakness. Journey before destination.’” “Lost Radiants?” Skar said, carrying an armful of boots. “Who’s bringing them up?” “Teft did,” Moash said. “I did not! That was just something I heard once.” “What does it even mean?” Dunny asked. “I said I don’t know!” Teft said. “It was supposedly one of their creeds,” Sigzil said. “In Yulay, there are groups of people who talk of the Radiants. And wish for their return.” “Who’d want them to return?” Skar said, leaning back against the wall, folding his arms. “They betrayed us to the Voidbringers.” “Ha!” Rock said. “Voidbringers! Lowlander nonsense. Is campfire tale told by children.” “They were real,” Skar said defensively. “Everyone knows that.” “Everyone who listens to campfire stories!” Rock said with a laugh. “Too much air! Makes your minds soft. Is all right, though—you are still my family. Just the dumb ones!” Teft scowled as the others continued to talk about the Lost Radiants. “Journey before destination,” Syl whispered on Kaladin’s shoulder. “I like that.” “Why?” Kaladin asked, kneeling down to untie the dead bridgeman’s sandals. “Because,” she replied, as if that were explanation enough. “Teft is right, Kaladin. I know you want to give up. But you can’t.” “Why not?” “Because you can’t.” “We’re assigned to chasm duty from now on,” Kaladin said. “We won’t be able to collect any more reeds to make money. That means no more bandages, antiseptic, or food for the nightly meals. With all of these bodies, we’re bound to run into rotspren, and the men will grow sick—assuming chasmfiends don’t eat us or a surprise highstorm doesn’t drown us. And we’ll have to keep running those bridges until Damnation ends, losing man after man. It’s hopeless.” The men were still talking. “The Lost Radiants helped the
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other side,” Skar argued. “They were tarnished all along.” Teft took offense at that. The wiry man stood up straight, pointing at Skar. “You don’t know anything! It was too long ago. Nobody knows what really happened.” “Then why do all the stories say the same thing?” Skar demanded. “They abandoned us. Just like the lighteyes are abandoning us right now. Maybe Kaladin’s right. Maybe there is no hope.” Kaladin looked down. Those words haunted him. Maybe Kaladin is right…maybe there is no hope…. He’d done this before. Under his last own er, before being sold to Tvlakv and being made a bridgeman. He’d given up on a quiet night after leading Goshel and the other slaves in rebellion. They’d been slaughtered. But somehow he’d survived. Storm it all, why did he always survive? I can’t do it again, he thought, squeezing his eyes shut. I can’t help them. Tien. Tukks. Goshel. Dallet. The nameless slave he’d tried to heal in Tvlakv’s slave wagons. All had ended up the same. Kaladin had the touch of failure. Sometimes he gave them hope, but what was hope except another opportunity for failure? How many times could a man fall before he no longer stood back up? “I just think we’re ignorant,” Teft grumbled. “I don’t like listening to what the lighteyes say about the past. Their women write all the histories, you know.” “I can’t believe you’re arguing about this, Teft,” Skar said, exasperated. “What next? Should we let the Voidbringers steal our hearts? Maybe they’re just misunderstood. Or the Parshendi. Maybe we should just let them kill our king whenever they want.” “Would you two just storm off?” Moash snapped. “It doesn’t matter. You heard Kaladin. Even he thinks we’re as good as dead.” Kaladin couldn’t take their voices anymore. He stumbled away, into the darkness, away from the torchlight. None of the men followed him. He entered a place of dark shadows, with only the distant ribbon of sky above for light. Here, Kaladin escaped their eyes. In the darkness he ran into a boulder, stumbling to a stop. It was slick with moss and lichen. He stood with his hands pressed against it, then groaned and turned around to lean back against it. Syl alighted in front of him, still visible, despite the darkness. She sat down in the air, arranging her dress around her legs. “I can’t save them, Syl,” Kaladin whispered, anguished. “Are you certain?” “I’ve failed every time before.” “And so you’ll fail this time too?” “Yes.” She fell silent. “Well then,” she eventually said. “Let’s say that you’re right.” “So why fight? I told myself that I would try one last time. But I failed before I began. There’s no saving them.” “Doesn’t the fight itself mean anything?” “Not if you’re destined to die.” He hung his head. Sigzil’s words echoed in his head. Life before death. Strength before weakness. Journey before destination. Kaladin looked up at the crack of sky. Like a faraway river of pure, blue water. Life before death. What did the saying mean?
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That men should seek life before seeking death? That was obvious. Or did it mean something else? That life came before death? Again, obvious. And yet the simple words spoke to him. Death comes, they whispered. Death comes to all. But life comes first. Cherish it. Death is the destination. But the journey, that is life. That is what matters. A cold wind blew through the corridor of stone, washing over him, bringing crisp, fresh scents and blowing away the stink of rotting corpses. Nobody cared for the bridgemen. Nobody cared for those at the bottom, with the darkest eyes. And yet, that wind seemed to whisper to him over and over. Life before death. Life before death. Live before you die. His foot hit something. He bent down and picked it up. A small rock. He could barely make it out in the darkness. He recognized what was happening to him, this melancholy, this sense of despair. It had taken him often when he’d been younger, most frequently during the weeks of the Weeping, when the sky was hidden by clouds. During those times, Tien had cheered him up, helped him pull out of his despair. Tien had always been able to do that. Once he’d lost his brother, he’d dealt with these periods of sadness more awkwardly. He’d become the wretch, not caring—but also not despairing. It had seemed better not to feel at all, as opposed to feeling pain. I’m going to fail them, Kaladin thought, squeezing his eyes shut. Why try? Wasn’t he a fool to keep grasping as he did? If only he could win once. That would be enough. As long as he could believe that he could help someone, as long as he believed that some paths led to places other than darkness, he could hope. You promised yourself you would try one last time, he thought. They aren’t dead yet. Still alive. For now. There was one thing he hadn’t tried. Something he’d been too frightened of. Every time he’d tried it in the past, he’d lost everything. The wretch seemed to be standing before him. He meant release. Apathy. Did Kaladin really want to go back to that? It was a false refuge. Being that man hadn’t protected him. It had only led him deeper and deeper until taking his own life had seemed the better way. Life before death. Kaladin stood up, opening his eyes, dropping the small rock. He walked slowly back toward the torchlight. The bridgemen looked up from their work. So many questioning eyes. Some doubtful, some grim, others encouraging. Rock, Dunny, Hobber, Leyten. They believed in him. He had survived the storms. One miracle granted. “There is something we could try,” Kaladin said. “But it will most likely end with us all dead at the hands of our own army.” “We’re bound to end up dead anyway,” Maps noted. “You said so yourself.” Several of the others nodded. Kaladin took a deep breath. “We have to try to escape.” “But the warcamp is guarded!” said Earless Jaks. “Bridgemen
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aren’t allowed out without supervision. They know we’d run.” “We’d die,” Moash said, face grim. “We’re miles and miles from civilization. There’s nothing out here but greatshells, and no shelter from highstorms.” “I know,” Kaladin said. “But it’s either this or the Parshendi arrows.” The men fell silent. “They’re going to send us down here every day to rob corpses,” Kaladin said. “And they don’t send us with supervision, since they fear the chasmfiends. Most bridgeman work is busywork, to distract us from our fate, so we only have to bring back a small amount of salvage.” “You think we should choose one of these chasms and flee down it?” Skar asked. “They’ve tried to map them all. The crews never reached the other side of the Plains—they got killed by chasmfiends or highstorm floods.” Kaladin shook his head. “That’s not what we’re going to do.” He kicked at something on the ground before him—a fallen spear. His kick sent it into the air toward Moash, who caught it, surprised. “I can train you to use those,” Kaladin said softly. The men fell silent, looking at the weapon. “What good would this thing do?” Rock asked, taking the spear from Moash, looking it over. “We cannot fight an army.” “No,” Kaladin said. “But if I train you, then we can attack a guard post at night. We might be able to get away.” Kaladin looked at them, meeting each man’s eyes in turn. “Once we’re free, they’ll send soldiers after us. Sadeas won’t let bridgemen kill his soldiers and get away with it. We’ll have to hope he underestimates us and sends a small group at first. If we kill them, we might be able to get far enough away to hide. It will be dangerous. Sadeas will go to great lengths to recapture us, and we’ll likely end with an entire company chasing us down. Storm it, we’ll probably never escape the camp in the first place. But it’s something.” He fell silent, waiting as the men exchanged uncertain glances. “I’ll do it,” Teft said, straightening up. “Me too,” Moash said, stepping forward. He seemed eager. “And I,” Sigzil said. “I would rather spit in their Alethi faces and die on their swords than remain a slave.” “Ha!” Rock said. “And I shall cook you all much food to keep you full while you kill.” “You won’t fight with us?” Dunny asked, surprised. “Is beneath me,” Rock said raising his chin. “Well, I’ll do it,” Dunny said. “I’m your man, Captain.” Others began to chime in, each man standing, several grabbing spears from the wet ground. They didn’t yell in excitement or roar like other troops Kaladin had led. They were frightened by the idea of fighting—most had been common slaves or lowly workmen. But they were willing. Kaladin stepped forward and began to outline a plan. FIVE YEARS AGO Kaladin hated the Weeping. It marked the end of an old year and the coming of a new one, four solid weeks of rain in a ceaseless cascade of sullen drops.
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Never furious, never passionate like a highstorm. Slow, steady. Like the blood of a dying year that was taking its last few shambling steps toward the cairn. While other seasons of weather came and went unpredictably, the Weeping never failed to return at the same time each year. Unfortunately. Kaladin lay on the sloped roof of his house in Hearthstone. A small pail of pitch sat next to him, covered by a piece of wood. It was almost empty now that he’d finished patching the roof. The Weeping was a miserable time to do this work, but it was also when a persistent leak could be most irritating. They’d repatch when the Weeping ended, but at least this way they wouldn’t have to suffer a steady stream of drips onto their dining table for the next weeks. He lay on his back, staring up at the sky. Perhaps he should have climbed down and gone inside, but he was already soaked through. So he stayed. Watching, thinking. Another army was passing through the town. One of many these days—they often came during the Weeping, resupplying and moving to new battlefields. Roshone had made a rare appearance to welcome the warlord: Highmarshal Amaram himself, apparently a distant cousin as well as head of Alethi defense in this area. He was of the most renowned soldiers still in Alethkar; most had left for the Shattered Plains. The small raindrops misted Kaladin. Many of the others liked these weeks—there were no highstorms, save for one right in the middle. To the townspeople, it was a cherished time to rest from farming and relax. But Kaladin longed for the sun and the wind. He actually missed the highstorms, with their rage and vitality. These days were dreary, and he found it difficult to get anything productive done. As if the lack of storms left him without strength. Few people had seen much of Roshone since the ill-fated whitespine hunt and the death of his son. He hid in his mansion, increasingly reclusive. The people of Hearthstone trod very lightly, as if they expected that any moment he could explode and turn his rage against them. Kaladin wasn’t worried about that. A storm—whether from a person or the sky—was something you could react to. But this suffocation, this slow and steady dousing of life…That was far, far worse. “Kaladin?” Tien’s voice called. “Are you still up there?” “Yeah,” he called back, not moving. The clouds were so bland during the Weeping. Could anything be more lifeless than that miserable grey? Tien rounded to the back of the building, where the roof sloped down to touch the ground. He had his hands in the pockets of his long raincoat, a wide-brimmed hat on his head. Both looked too large for him, but clothing always seemed too large for Tien. Even when it fit him properly. Kaladin’s brother climbed up onto the roof and walked up beside him, then lay down, staring upward. Someone else might have tried to cheer Kaladin up, and they would have failed. But somehow
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Tien knew the right thing to do. For the moment, that was keeping silent. “You like the rain, don’t you?” Kaladin finally asked him. “Yeah,” Tien said. Of course, Tien liked pretty much everything. “Hard to stare up at like this, though. I keep blinking.” For some reason, that made Kaladin smile. “I made you something,” Tien said. “At the shop today.” Kaladin’s parents were worried; Ral the carpenter had taken Tien, though he didn’t really need another apprentice, and was reportedly dissatisfied with the boy’s work. Tien got distracted easily, Ral complained. Kaladin sat up as Tien fished something out of his pocket. It was a small wooden horse, intricately carved. “Don’t worry about the water,” Tien said, handing it over. “I sealed it already.” “Tien,” Kaladin said, amazed. “This is beautiful.” The details were amazing—the eyes, the hooves, the lines in the tail. It looked just like the majestic animals that pulled Roshone’s carriage. “Did you show this to Ral?” “He said it was good,” Tien said, smiling beneath his oversized hat. “But he told me I should have been making a chair instead. I kind of got into trouble.” “But how…I mean, Tien, he’s got to see this is amazing!” “Oh, I don’t know about that,” Tien said, still smiling. “It’s just a horse. Master Ral likes things you can use. Things to sit on, things to put clothes in. But I think I can make a good chair tomorrow, something that will make him proud.” Kaladin looked at his brother, with his innocent face and affable nature. He hadn’t lost either, though he was now into his teenage years. How is it you can always smile? Kaladin thought. It’s dreadful outside, your master treats you like crem, and your family is slowly being strangled by the citylord. And yet you smile. How, Tien? And why is it that you make me want to smile too? “Father spent another of the spheres, Tien,” Kaladin found himself saying. Each time their father was forced to do that, he seemed to grow a little more wan, stand a little less tall. Those spheres were dun these days, no light in them. You couldn’t infuse spheres during the Weeping. They all ran out, eventually. “There are plenty more,” Tien said. “Roshone is trying to wear us down,” Kaladin said. “Bit by bit, smother us.” “It’s not as bad as it seems, Kaladin,” his brother said, reaching up to hold his arm. “Things are never as bad as they seem. You’ll see.” So many objections rose in his mind, but Tien’s smile banished them. There, in the midst of the dreariest part of the year, Kaladin felt for a moment as if he had glimpsed sunshine. He could swear he felt things grow brighter around them, the storm retreating a shade, the sky lightening. Their mother rounded the back of the building. She looked up at them, as if amused to find them both sitting on the roof in the rain. She stepped onto the lower portion. A small group of haspers clung
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to the stone there; the small two-shelled creatures proliferated during the Weeping. They seemed to grow out of nowhere, much like their cousins the tiny snails, scattered all across the stone. “What are you two talking about?” she asked, walking up and sitting down with them. Hesina rarely acted like the other mothers in town. Sometimes, that bothered Kaladin. Shouldn’t she have sent them into the house or something, complaining that they’d catch a cold? No, she just sat down with them, wearing a brown leather raincoat. “Kaladin’s worried about Father spending the spheres,” Tien said. “Oh, I wouldn’t worry about that,” she replied. “We’ll get you to Kharbranth. You’ll be old enough to leave in two more months.” “You two should come with me,” Kal said. “And Father too.” “And leave the town?” Tien said, as if he’d never considered that possibility. “But I like it here.” Hesina smiled. “What?” Kaladin said. “Most young men your age are trying everything they can to be rid of their parents.” “I can’t go off and leave you here. We’re a family.” “He’s trying to strangle us,” Kaladin said, glancing at Tien. Talking with his brother had made him feel a lot better, but his objections were still there. “Nobody pays for healing, and I know nobody will pay you for work anymore. What kind of value does Father get for those spheres he spends anyway? Vegetables at ten times the regular price, moldy grain at double?” Hesina smiled. “Observant.” “Father taught me to notice details. The eyes of a surgeon.” “Well,” she said, eyes twinkling, “did your surgeon’s eyes notice the first time we spent one of the spheres?” “Sure,” Kaladin said. “It was the day after the hunting accident. Father had to buy new cloth to make bandages.” “And did we need new bandages?” “Well, no. But you know how Father is. He doesn’t like it when we start to run even a little low.” “And so he spent one of those spheres,” Hesina said. “That he’d hoarded for months and months, butting heads with the citylord over them.” Not to mention going to such lengths to steal them in the first place, Kaladin thought. But you know all about that. He glanced at Tien, who was watching the sky again. So far as Kal knew, his brother hadn’t discovered the truth yet. “So your father resisted so long,” Hesina said, “only to finally break and spend a sphere on some cloth bandages we wouldn’t need for months.” She had a point. Why had his father suddenly decided to…“He’s letting Roshone think he’s winning,” Kaladin said with surprise, looking back at her. Hesina smiled slyly. “Roshone would have found a way to get retribution eventually. It wouldn’t have been easy. Your father ranks high as a citizen, and has the right of inquest. He did save Roshone’s life, and many could testify to the severity of Rillir’s wounds. But Roshone would have found a way. Unless he felt he’d broken us.” Kaladin turned toward the mansion. Though it was hidden by the
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shroud of rain, he could just make out the tents of the army camped on the field below. What would it be like to live as a soldier, often exposed to storms and rain, to winds and tempests? Once Kaladin would have been intrigued, but the life of a spearman had no call for him now. His mind was filled with diagrams of muscles and memorized lists of symptoms and diseases. “We’ll keep spending the spheres,” Hesina said. “One every few weeks. Partially to live, though my family has offered supplies. More to keep Roshone thinking that we’re bending. And then, we send you away. Unexpectedly. You’ll be gone, the spheres safely in the hands of the ardents to use as a stipend during your years of study.” Kaladin blinked in realization. They weren’t losing. They were winning. “Think of it, Kaladin,” Tien said. “You’ll live in one of the grandest cities in the world! It will be so exciting. You’ll be a man of learning, like Father. You’ll have clerks to read to you from any book you want.” Kaladin pushed wet hair off his forehead. Tien made it sound a lot grander than he’d been thinking. Of course, Tien could make a crem-filled puddle sound grand. “That’s true,” his mother said, still staring upward. “You could learn mathematics, history, politics, tactics, the sciences…” “Aren’t those things women learn?” Kaladin said, frowning. “Lighteyed women study them. But there are male scholars as well. If not as many.” “All this to become a surgeon.” “You wouldn’t have to become a surgeon. Your life is your own, son. If you take the path of a surgeon, we will be proud. But don’t feel that you need to live your father’s life for him.” She looked down at Kaladin, blinking rainwater from her eyes. “What else would I do?” Kaladin said, stupefied. “There are many professions open to men with a good mind and training. If you really wished to study all the arts, you could become an ardent. Or perhaps a stormwarden.” Stormwarden. He reached by reflex for the prayer sewn to his left sleeve, waiting for the day he’d need to burn it for aid. “They seek to predict the future.” “It’s not the same thing. You’ll see. There are so many things to explore, so many places your mind could go. The world is changing. My family’s most recent letter describes amazing fabrials, like pens that can write across great distances. It might not be long before men are taught to read.” “I’d never want to learn something like that,” Kaladin said, aghast, glancing at Tien. Was their own mother really saying these things? But then, she’d always been like this. Free, both with her mind and her tongue. Yet, to become a stormwarden…They studied the highstorms, predicted them—yes—but learned about them and their mysteries. They studied the winds themselves. “No,” Kaladin said. “I want to be a surgeon. Like my father.” Hesina smiled. “If that’s what you choose, then—as I said—we will be proud of you. But father and I
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just want you to know that you can choose.” They sat like that for some time, letting rainwater soak them. Kaladin kept searching those grey clouds, wondering what it was that Tien found so interesting in them. Eventually, he heard splashing below, and Lirin’s face appeared at the side of the house. “What in the…” he said. “All three of you? What are you doing up here?” “Feasting,” Kaladin’s mother said nonchalantly. “On what?” “On irregularity, dear,” she said. Lirin sighed. “Dear, you can be very odd, you know.” “And didn’t I just say that?” “Point. Well, come on. There’s a gathering in the square.” Hesina frowned. She rose and walked down the slope of the roof. Kaladin glanced at Tien, and the two of them stood. Kaladin stuffed the wooden horse in his pocket and picked his way down, careful on the slick rock, his shoes squishing. Cool water ran down Kaladin’s cheeks as he stepped off onto the ground. They followed Lirin toward the square. Kaladin’s father looked worried, and he walked with the beaten-down slouch he was prone to lately. Maybe it was an affectation to fool Roshone, but Kaladin suspected there was some truth to it. His father didn’t like having to give up those spheres, even if it was part of a ruse. It was too much like giving in. Ahead, a crowd was gathering at the town square, everyone holding umbrellas or wearing cloaks. “What is it, Lirin?” Hesina asked, sounding anxious. “Roshone is going to put in an appearance,” Lirin said. “He asked Waber to gather everyone. Full town meeting.” “In the rain?” Kaladin asked. “Couldn’t he have waited for Lightday?” Lirin didn’t reply. The family walked in silence, even Tien growing solemn. They passed some rainspren standing in puddles, glowing with a faint blue light, shaped like ankle-high melting candles with no flame. They rarely appeared except during the Weeping. They were said to be the souls of raindrops, glowing blue rods, seeming to melt but never growing smaller, a single blue eye at their tops. The townspeople were mostly assembled, gossiping in the rain, by the time Kaladin’s family arrived. Jost and Naget were there, though neither waved to Kaladin; it had been years since they’d been anything resembling friends. Kaladin shivered. His parents called this town home, and his father refused to leave, but it felt less and less like “home” by the day. I’ll be leaving it soon, he thought, eager to walk out of Hearthstone and leave these small-minded people behind. To go to a place where lighteyes were men and women of honor and beauty, worthy of the high station given them by the Almighty. Roshone’s carriage approached. It had lost much of its luster during his years in Hearthstone, the golden paint flaking off, the dark wood chipped by road gravel. As the carriage pulled into the square, Waber and his boys finally got a small canopy erected. The rain had strengthened, and drops hit the cloth with a hollow drumming sound. The air smelled different with all
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of these people around. Up on the roof, it had been fresh and clean. Now it seemed muggy and humid. The carriage door opened. Roshone had gained more weight, and his lighteyes’s suit had been retailored to fit his increased girth. He wore a wooden peg on his right stump, hidden by the cuff of his trouser, and his gait was stiff as he climbed out of the carriage and ducked beneath the canopy, grumbling. He hardly seemed the same person, with that beard and wet, stringy hair. But his eyes, they were the same. More beady now because of the fuller cheeks, but still seething as he studied the crowd. As if he had been hit with a rock when he wasn’t looking, and now searched for the culprit. Was Laral inside the carriage? Someone else moved inside, climbing out, but it turned out to be a lean man with a clean-shaven face and light tan eyes. The dignified man wore a neatly pressed, green formal military uniform and had a sword at his hip. Highmarshal Amaram? He certainly looked impressive, with that strong figure and square face. The difference between him and Roshone was striking. Finally, Laral did appear, wearing a light yellow dress of an antique fashion, with a flaring skirt and thick bodice. She glanced up at the rain, then waited for a footman to hurry over with an umbrella. Kaladin felt his heart thumping. They hadn’t spoken since the day she’d humiliated him in Roshone’s mansion. And yet, she was gorgeous. As she had grown through her adolescence, she had gotten prettier and prettier. Some might find that dark hair sprinkled with foreigner blond to be unappealing for its indication of mixed blood, but to Kaladin it was alluring. Beside Kaladin, his father stiffened, cursing softly. “What?” Tien asked from beside Kaladin, craning to see. “Laral,” Kaladin’s mother said. “She’s wearing a bride’s prayer on her sleeve.” Kaladin started, seeing the white cloth with its blue glyphpair sewn onto the sleeve of her dress. She’d burn it when the engagement was formally announced. But…who? Rillir was dead! “I’d heard rumors of this,” Kaladin’s father said. “It appears Roshone wasn’t willing to part with the connections she offers.” “Him?” Kaladin asked, stunned. Roshone himself was marrying her? Others in the crowd had begun speaking as they noticed the prayer. “Lighteyes marry much younger women all the time,” Kaladin’s mother said. “For them, marriages are often about securing house loyalty.” “Him?” Kaladin asked again, incredulous, stepping forward. “We have to stop it. We have to—” “Kaladin,” his father said sharply. “But—” “It is their affair, not ours.” Kaladin fell silent, feeling the larger raindrops hit his head, the smaller ones blowing by as mist. The water ran through the square and pooled in depressions. Near Kaladin, a rainspren sprang up, forming as if out of the water. It stared upward, unblinking. Roshone leaned on his cane and nodded to Natir, his steward. The man was accompanied by his wife, a stern-looking woman named Alaxia. Natir clapped his slender hands
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to quiet the crowd, and soon the only sound was that of the soft rain. “Brightlord Amaram,” Roshone said, nodding to the lighteyed man in the uniform, “is absendiar highmarshal of our princedom. He is in command of defending our borders while the king and Brightlord Sadeas are away.” Kaladin nodded. Everyone knew of Amaram. He was far more important than most military men who passed through Hearthstone. Amaram stepped forward to speak. “You have a fine town here,” Amaram said to the gathered darkeyes. He had a strong, deep voice. “Thank you for hosting me.” Kaladin frowned, glancing at the other townspeople. They seemed as confused as he by the statement. “Normally,” Amaram said, “I would leave this task to one of my subordinate officers. But as I was visiting with my cousin, I decided to come down in person. It is not so onerous a task that I need delegate it.” “Excuse me, Brightlord,” said Callins, one of the farmers. “But what duty is that?” “Why, recruitment, good farmer,” Amaram said, nodding to Alaxia, who stepped forward with a sheet of paper strapped to a board. “The king took most of our armies with him on his quest to fulfill the Vengeance Pact. My forces are undermanned, and it has become necessary to recruit young men from each town or village we pass. I do this with volunteers whenever possible.” The townspeople fell still. Boys talked of running off to the army, but few of them would actually do it. Hearthstone’s duty was to provide food. “My fighting is not as glorious as the war for vengeance,” Amaram said, “but it is our sacred duty to defend our lands. This tour will be for four years, and upon completing your duty, you will receive a war bonus equal to one-tenth your total wages. You may then return, or you may sign up for further duty. Distinguish yourself and rise to a high rank, and it could mean an increase of one nahn for you and your children. Are there any volunteers?” “I’ll go,” Jost said, stepping forward. “Me too,” Abry added. “Jost!” Jost’s mother said, grabbing his arm. “The crops—” “Your crops are important, darkwoman,” Amaram said, “but not nearly as important as the defense of our people. The king sends back riches from the plundered Plains, and the gemstones he has captured can provide food for Alethkar in emergency. You two are both welcome. Are there any others?” Three more boys from the town stepped forward, and one older man—Harl, who had lost his wife to the scarfever. He was the man whose daughter Kaladin hadn’t been able to save after her fall. “Excellent,” Amaram said. “Are there any others?” The townspeople were still. Oddly so. Many of the boys Kaladin had heard talk so often about joining the army looked away. Kaladin felt his heart beating, and his leg twitched, as if itching to propel him forward. No. He was to be a surgeon. Lirin looked at him, and his dark brown eyes displayed hints of deep concern.
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But when Kaladin didn’t make any moves forward, he relaxed. “Very well,” Amaram said, nodding to Roshone. “We will need your list after all.” “List?” Lirin asked loudly. Amaram glanced at him. “The need of our army is great, darkborn. I will take volunteers first, but the army must be replenished. As citylord, my cousin has the duty and honor of deciding which men to send.” “Read the first four names, Alaxia,” Roshone said, “and the last one.” Alaxia looked down at her list, speaking with a dry voice. “Agil, son of Marf. Caull, son of Taleb.” Kaladin looked up at Lirin with apprehension. “He can’t take you,” Lirin said. “We’re of the second nahn and provide an essential function to the town—I as surgeon, you as my only apprentice. By the law, we are exempt from conscription. Roshone knows it.” “Habrin, son of Arafik,” Alaxia continued. “Jorna, son of Loats.” She hesitated, then looked up. “Tien, son of Lirin.” There was a stillness across the square. Even the rain seemed to hesitate for a moment. Then, all eyes turned toward Tien. The boy looked dumbfounded. Lirin was immune as town surgeon, Kaladin immune as his apprentice. But not Tien. He was a carpenter’s third apprentice, not vital, not immune. Hesina gripped Tien tightly. “No!” Lirin stepped in front of them, defensive. Kaladin stood stunned, looking at Roshone. Smiling, self-satisfied Roshone. We took his son, Kaladin realized, meeting those beady eyes. This is his revenge. “I…” Tien said. “The military?” For once, he seemed to lose his confidence, his optimism. His eyes opened wide, and he grew very pale. He fainted when he saw blood. He hated fighting. He was still small and spindly despite his age. “He’s too young,” Lirin declared. Their neighbors sidled away, leaving Lirin’s family to stand alone in the rain. Amaram frowned. “In the cities, youths as young as eight and nine are accepted into the military.” “Lighteyed sons!” Lirin said. “To be trained as officers. They aren’t sent into battle!” Amaram frowned more deeply. He stepped out into the rain, walking up to the family. “How old are you, son?” he asked Tien. “He’s thirteen,” Lirin said. Amaram glanced at him. “The surgeon. I’ve heard of you.” He sighed, glancing back at Amaram. “I haven’t the time to engage in your petty, small-town politics, cousin. Isn’t there another boy that will do?” “It is my choice!” Roshone insisted. “Given me by the dictates of law. I send those the town can spare—well, that boy is the first one we can spare.” Lirin stepped forward, eyes full of anger. Highmarshal Amaram caught him by the arm. “Do not do something you would regret, darkborn. Roshone has acted according to the law.” “You hid behind the law, sneering at me, surgeon,” Roshone called to Lirin. “Well, now it turns against you. Keep those spheres! The look on your face at this moment is worth the price of every one of them!” “I…” Tien said again. Kaladin had never seen the boy so terrified. Kaladin felt powerless. The crowd’s
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eyes were on Lirin, standing with his arm in the grip of the lighteyed general, locking his gaze with Roshone. “I’ll make the lad a runner boy for a year or two,” Amaram promised. “He won’t be in combat. It is the best I can do. Every body is needed in these times.” Lirin slumped, then bowed his head. Roshone laughed, motioning Laral toward the carriage. She didn’t glance at Kaladin as she climbed back in. Roshone followed, and though he was still laughing, his expression had grown hard. Lifeless. Like the dull clouds above. He had his revenge, but his son was still dead and he was still stuck in Hearthstone. Amaram regarded the crowd. “The recruits may bring two changes of clothing and up to three stoneweights of other possessions. They will be weighed. Report to the army in two hours and ask for Sergeant Hav.” He turned and followed Roshone. Tien stared after him, pale as a whitewashed building. Kaladin could see his terror at leaving his family. His brother, the one who always made him smile when it rained. It was physically painful for Kaladin to see him so scared. It wasn’t right. Tien should smile. That was who he was. He felt the wooden horse in his pocket. Tien always brought him relief when he felt pained. Suddenly, it occurred to him that there was something he could do in turn. It’s time to stop hiding in the room when someone else holds up the globe of light, Kaladin thought. It’s time to be a man. “Brightlord Amaram!” Kaladin yelled. The general hesitated, standing on the stepstool into the carriage, one foot in the door. He glanced over his shoulder. “I want to take Tien’s place,” Kaladin said. “Not allowed!” Roshone said from inside the carriage. “The law says I may choose.” Amaram nodded grimly. “Then what if you take me as well,” Kaladin said. “Can I volunteer?” That way, at least, Tien wouldn’t be alone. “Kaladin!” Hesina said, grabbing him on one arm. “It is allowed,” Amaram said. “I will not turn away any soldier, son. If you want to join, you are welcome.” “Kaladin, no,” Lirin said. “Don’t both of you go. Don’t—” Kaladin looked at Tien, the boy’s face wet beneath his wide-brimmed hat. He shook his head, but his eyes seemed hopeful. “I volunteer,” Kaladin said, turning back to Amaram. “I’ll go.” “Then you have two hours,” Amaram said, climbing into the carriage. “Same possession allotment as the others.” The carriage door shut, but not before Kaladin got a glimpse of an even more satisfied Roshone. Rattling, the vehicle splashed away, dropping a sheet of water from its roof. “Why?” Lirin said, turning back to Kaladin, his voice ragged. “Why have you done this to me? After all of our plans!” Kaladin turned to Tien. The boy took his arm. “Thank you,” Tien whispered. “Thank you, Kaladin. Thank you.” “I’ve lost both of you,” Lirin said hoarsely, splashing away. “Storm it! Both of you.” He was crying. Kaladin’s mother was crying too. She
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clutched Tien again. “Father!” Kaladin said, turning, amazed at how confident he felt. Lirin paused, standing in the rain, one foot in a puddle where rainspren clustered. They inched away from him like vertical slugs. “In four years, I will bring him home safely,” Kaladin said. “I promise it by the storms and the Almighty’s tenth name itself. I will bring him back.” I promise…. They are an oddly welcoming group, these wild parshmen, Shallan read. It was King Gavilar’s account again, recorded a year before his murder. It has now been nearly five months since our first meeting. Dalinar continues to pressure me to return to our homeland, insisting that the expedition has stretched too long. The parshmen promise that they will lead me on a hunt for a great-shelled beast they call an ulo mas vara, which my scholars say translates roughly to “Monster of the Chasms.” If their descriptions are accurate, these creatures have large gemhearts, and one of their heads would make a truly impressive trophy. They also speak of their terrible gods, and we think they must be referring to several particularly large chasm greatshells. We are amazed to find religion among these parshmen. The mounting evidence of a complete parshman society—with civilization, culture, and a unique language—is astounding. My stormwardens have begun calling this people “the Parshendi.” It is obvious this group is very different from our ordinary servant parshmen, and may not even be the same race, despite the skin patterns. Perhaps they are distant cousins, as different from ordinary parshmen as Alethi axehounds are from the Selay breed. The Parshendi have seen our servants, and are confused by them. “Where is their music?” Klade will often ask me. I do not know what he means. But our servants do not react to the Parshendi at all, showing no interest in emulating them. This is reassuring. The question about music may have to do with the humming and chanting the Parshendi often do. They have an uncanny ability to make music together. I swear that I have left one Parshendi singing to himself, then soon passed another out of earshot of the first, yet singing the very same song—eerily near to the other in tempo, tune, and lyric. Their favored instrument is the drum. They are crudely made, with handprints of paint marking the sides. This matches their simple buildings, which they construct of crem and stone. They build them in the craterlike rock formations here at the edge of the Shattered Plains. I ask Klade if they worry about highstorms, but he just laughs. “Why worry? If the buildings blow down, we can build them again, can we not?” On the other side of the alcove, Jasnah’s book rustled as she turned a page. Shallan set aside her own volume, then picked through the books on the desk. Her philosophy training done for the time being, she had returned to her study of King Gavilar’s murder. She slid a small volume out from the bottom of the stack: a record dictated by Stormwarden Matain,
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one of the scholars who had accompanied the king. Shallan flipped through the pages, searching for a specific passage. It was a description of the very first Parshendi hunting party they encountered. It happened after we set up beside a deep river in a heavily wooded area. It was an ideal location for a long-term camp, as the dense cobwood trees would protect against highstorm winds, and the river’s gorge eliminated the risk of flooding. His Majesty wisely took my advice, sending scouting parties both upriver and down. Highprince Dalinar’s scouting party was the first to encounter the strange, untamed parshmen. When he returned to camp with his story, I—like many others—refused to believe his claims. Surely Brightlord Dalinar had simply run across the parshman servants of another expedition like our own. Once they visited our camp the next day, their reality could no longer be denied. There were ten of them—parshmen to be sure, but bigger than the familiar ones. Some had skin marbled black and red, and others were marbled white and red, as is more common in Alethkar. They carried magnificent weapons, the bright steel etched with complex decorations, but wore simple clothing of woven narbin cloth. Before long, His Majesty became fascinated by these strange parshmen, insisting that I begin a study of their language and society. I’ll admit that my original intent was to expose them as a hoax of some kind. The more we learned, however, the more I came to realize how faulty my original assessment had been. Shallan tapped the page, thinking. Then she pulled out a thick volume, titled King Gavilar Kholin, a Biography, published by Gavilar’s widow, Navani, two years before. Shallan flipped through pages, scanning for a particular paragraph. My husband was an excellent king—an inspiring leader, an unparalleled duelist, and a genius of battlefield tactics. But he didn’t have a single scholarly finger on his left hand. He never showed an interest in the accounting of highstorms, was bored by talk of science, and ignored fabrials unless they had an obvious use in battle. He was a man built after the classical masculine ideal. “Why was he so interested in them?” Shallan said out loud. “Hmmm?” Jasnah asked. “King Gavilar,” Shallan said. “Your mother insists in her biography that he wasn’t a scholar.” “True.” “But he was interested in the Parshendi,” Shallan said. “Even before he could have known about their Shardblades. According to Matain’s account, he wanted to know about their language, their society, and their music. Was that just embellishment, to make him sound more scholarly to future readers?” “No,” Jasnah said, lowering her own book. “The longer he remained in the Unclaimed Hills, the more fascinated by the Parshendi he became.” “So there’s a discrepancy. Why would a man with no prior interest in scholarship suddenly become so obsessed?” “Yes,” Jasnah said. “I too have wondered about this. But sometimes, people change. When he returned, I was encouraged by his interest; we spent many evenings talking about his discoveries. It was one of the few times when
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I felt I really connected with my father.” Shallan bit her lip. “Jasnah,” she finally asked. “Why did you assign me to research this event? You lived through this; you already know everything I’m ‘discovering.’” “I feel a fresh perspective may be of value.” Jasnah put down her book, looking over at Shallan. “I don’t intend for you to find specific answers. Instead, I hope that you will notice details I’ve missed. You are coming to see how my father’s personality changed during those months, and that means you are digging deeply. Believe it or not, few others have caught the discrepancy you just did—though many do note his later changes, once he returned to Kholinar.” “Even so, I feel a little odd studying it. Perhaps I’m still influenced by my tutors’ idea that only the classics are a proper realm of study for young ladies.” “The classics do have their place, and I will send you to classical works on occasion, as I did with your study of morality. But I intend such tangents to be adjuncts to your current projects. Those must be the focus, not long-lost historical conundrums.” Shallan nodded. “But Jasnah, aren’t you a historian? Aren’t those long-lost historical conundrums the meat of your field?” “I’m a Veristitalian,” Jasnah said. “We search for answers in the past, reconstructing what truly happened. To many, writing a history is not about truth, but about presenting the most flattering picture of themselves and their motives. My sisters and I choose projects that we feel were misunderstood or misrepresented, and in studying them hope to better understand the present.” Why, then, are you spending so much time studying folktales and looking for evil spirits? No, Jasnah was searching for something real. Something so important that it drew her away from the Shattered Plains and the fight to avenge her father. She intended to do something with those folktales, and Shallan’s research was part of it, somehow. That excited her. It was the sort of thing she’d wanted since she’d been a child, looking through her father’s few books, frustrated that he’d chased off yet another tutor. Here, with Jasnah, Shallan was part of something—and, knowing Jasnah, it was something big. And yet, she thought. Tozbek’s ship arrives tomorrow morning. I’ll be leaving. I need to start complaining. I need to convince Jasnah that this was all so much harder than I anticipated, so that when I leave she won’t be surprised. I need to cry, break down, give up. I need to— “What is Urithiru?” Shallan found herself asking instead. To her surprise, Jasnah answered without hesitation. “Urithiru was said to be the center of the Silver Kingdoms, a city that held ten thrones, one for each king. It was the most majestic, most amazing, most important city in all the world.” “Really? Why hadn’t I heard of it before?” “Because it was abandoned even before the Lost Radiants turned against mankind. Most scholars consider it just a myth. The ardents refuse to speak of it, due to its association with the
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Radiants, and therefore with the first major failure of Vorinism. Much of what we know about the city comes from fragments of lost works quoted by classical scholars. Many of those classical works have, themselves, survived only in pieces. Indeed, the single complete work we have from early years is The Way of Kings, and that is only because of the Vanrial’s efforts.” Shallan nodded slowly. “If there were ruins of a magnificent, ancient city hidden somewhere, Natanatan—unexplored, overgrown, wild—would be the natural place to find them.” “Urithiru is not in Natanatan,” Jasnah said, smiling. “But it is a good guess, Shallan. Return to your studies.” “The weapons,” Shallan said. Jasnah raised an eyebrow. “The Parshendi. They carried beautiful weapons of fine, etched steel. Yet they used skin drums with crude handprints on the sides and lived in huts of stone and crem. Doesn’t that strike you as incongruous?” “Yes. I would certainly describe that as an oddity.” “Then—” “I assure you, Shallan,” Jasnah said. “The city is not there.” “But you are interested in the Shattered Plains. You spoke of them with Brightlord Dalinar through the spanreed.” “I did.” “What were the Voidbringers?” Now that Jasnah was actually answering, perhaps she’d say. “What were they really?” Jasnah studied her with a curious expression. “Nobody knows for sure. Most scholars consider them, like Urithiru, mere myths, while theologians accept them as counterparts of the Almighty—monsters that dwelled in the hearts of men, much as the Almighty once lived there.” “But—” “Return to your studies, child,” Jasnah said, raising her book. “Perhaps we will speak of this another time.” There was an air of finality about that. Shallan bit her lip, keeping herself from saying something rude just to draw Jasnah back into conversation. She doesn’t trust me, she thought. Perhaps with good reason. You’re leaving, Shallan told herself again. Tomorrow. You’re sailing away from this. But that meant she had only one day left. One more day in the grand Palanaeum. One more day with all of these books, all of this power and knowledge. “I need a copy of Tifandor’s biography of your father,” Shallan said, poking through the books. “I keep seeing it referenced.” “It’s on one of the bottom floors,” Jasnah said idly. “I might be able to dig out the index number.” “No need,” Shallan said, standing. “I’ll look it up. I need the practice.” “As you wish,” Jasnah said. Shallan smiled. She knew exactly where the book was—but the pretense of searching for it would give her time away from Jasnah. And during that time, she’d see what she could discover about the Voidbringers on her own. Two hours later, Shallan sat at a cluttered desk at the back of one of the Palanaeum’s lower-level rooms, her sphere lantern illuminating a stack of hastily gathered volumes, none of which had proven much use. It seemed that everybody knew something about the Voidbringers. People in rural areas spoke of them as mysterious creatures that came out at night, stealing from the unlucky and punishing the foolish. Those Voidbringers
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seemed more mischievous than evil. But then there would be the odd story about a Voidbringer taking on the form of a wayward traveler who—after receiving kindness from a tallew farmer—would slaughter the entire family, drink their blood, then write voidish symbols across the walls in black ash. Most people in the cities, however, saw the Voidbringers as spirits who stalked at night, a kind of evil spren that invaded the hearts of men and made them do terrible things. When a good man grew angry, it was the work of a Voidbringer. Scholars laughed at all these ideas. Actual historical accounts—the ones she could find quickly—were contradictory. Were the Voidbringers the denizens of Damnation? If so, wouldn’t Damnation now be empty, as the Voidbringers had conquered the Tranquiline Halls and cast out mankind to Roshar? I should have known that I’d have trouble finding anything solid, Shallan thought, leaning back in her chair. Jasnah’s been researching this for months, maybe years. What did I expect to find in a few hours? The only thing the research had done was increase her confusion. What errant winds had brought Jasnah to this topic? It made no sense. Studying the Voidbringers was like trying to determine if deathspren were real or not. What was the point? She shook her head, stacking her books. The ardents would reshelve them for her. She needed to fetch Tifandor’s biography and return to their balcony. She rose and walked toward the room’s exit, carrying her lantern in her freehand. She hadn’t brought a parshman; she intended to carry back only the one book. As she reached the exit, she noticed another light approaching out on the balcony. Just before she arrived, someone stepped up to the doorway, holding aloft a garnet lantern. “Kabsal?” Shallan asked, surprised to see his youthful face, painted blue by the light. “Shallan?” he asked, looking up at the index inscription atop the entry-way. “What are you doing here? Jasnah said you were looking for Tifandor.” “I…got turned around.” He raised an eyebrow at her. “Bad lie?” she asked. “Terrible,” he said. “You’re two floors up and about a thousand index numbers off. After I couldn’t find you below, I asked the lift porters to take me where they brought you, and they took me here.” “Jasnah’s training can be exhausting,” Shallan said. “So I sometimes find a quiet corner to relax and compose myself. It’s the only time I get to be alone.” Kabsal nodded thoughtfully. “Better?” she asked. “Still problematic. You took a break, but for two hours? Besides, I remember you telling me that Jasnah’s training wasn’t so terrible.” “She’d believe me,” Shallan said. “She thinks she’s far more demanding than she is. Or…well, she is demanding. I just don’t mind as much as she thinks I do.” “Very well,” he said. “But what were you doing down here, then?” She bit her lip, causing him to laugh. “What?” she demanded, blushing. “You just look so blasted innocent when you do that!” “I am innocent.” “Didn’t you just lie to me
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twice in a row?” “Innocent, as in the opposite of sophisticated.” She grimaced. “Otherwise, they’d have been more convincing lies. Come. Walk with me while I fetch Tifandor. If we hurry, I won’t have to lie to Jasnah.” “Fair enough,” he said, joining her and strolling around the perimeter of the Palanaeum. The hollow inverted pyramid rose toward the ceiling far above, the four walls expanding outward at a slant. The topmost levels were brighter and easier to make out, tiny lights bobbing along railings in the hands of ardents or scholars. “Fifty-seven levels,” Shallan said. “I can’t even imagine how much work it must have been for you to create all this.” “We didn’t create it,” Kabsal said. “It was here. The main shaft, at least. The Kharbranthians cut out the rooms for the books.” “This formation is natural?” “As natural as cities like Kholinar. Or have you forgotten my demonstration?” “No. But why didn’t you use this place as one of your examples?” “We haven’t found the right sand pattern yet,” he said. “But we’re sure the Almighty himself made this place, as he did the cities.” “What about the Dawnsingers?” Shallan asked. “What about them?” “Could they have created it?” He chuckled as they arrived at the lift. “That isn’t the kind of thing the Dawnsingers did. They were healers, kindly spren sent by the Almighty to care for humans once we were forced out of the Tranquiline Halls.” “Kind of like the opposite of the Voidbringers.” “I suppose you could say that. “Take us down two levels,” she told the parshman lift porters. They began lowering the platform, the pulleys squeaking and wood shaking beneath her feet. “If you think to distract me with this conversation,” Kabsal noted, folding his arms and leaning back against the railing, “you won’t be successful. I sat up there with your disapproving mistress for well over an hour, and let me say that it was not a pleasant experience. I think she knows I still intend to try and convert her.” “Of course she does. She’s Jasnah. She knows practically everything.” “Except whatever it is she came here to study.” “The Voidbringers,” Shallan said. “That’s what she’s studying.” He frowned. A few moments later, the lift came to a rest on the appropriate floor. “The Voidbringers?” he said, sounding curious. She’d have expected him to be scornful or amused. No, she thought. He’s an ardent. He believes in them. “What were they?” she asked, walking out. Not far below, the massive cavern came to a point. There was a large infused diamond there, marking the nadir. “We don’t like to talk about it,” Kabsal said as he joined her. “Why not? You’re an ardent. This is part of your religion.” “An unpopular part. People prefer to hear about the Ten Divine Attributes or the Ten Human Failings. We accommodate them because we, also, prefer that to the deep past.” “Because…” she prodded. “Because,” he said with a sigh, “of our failure. Shallan, the devotaries—at their core—are still classical Vorinism. That means the
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Hierocracy and the fall of the Lost Radiants are our shame.” He held up his deep blue lantern. Shallan strolled at his side, curious, letting him just talk. “We believe that the Voidbringers were real, Shallan. A scourge and a plague. A hundred times they came upon mankind. First casting us from the Tranquiline Halls, then trying to destroy us here on Roshar. They weren’t just spren that hid under rocks, then came out to steal someone’s laundry. They were creatures of terrible destructive power, forged in Damnation, created from hate.” “By whom?” Shallan asked. “What?” “Who made them? I mean, the Almighty wasn’t likely to have ‘created something from hate.’ So what made them?” “Everything has its opposite, Shallan. The Almighty is a force of good. To balance his goodness, the cosmere needed the Voidbringers as his opposite.” “So the more good that the Almighty did, the more evil he created as a by-product? What’s the point of doing any good at all if it just creates more evil?” “I see Jasnah has continued your training in philosophy.” “That’s not philosophy,” Shallan said. “That’s simple logic.” He sighed. “I don’t think you want to get into the deep theology of this. Suffice it to say that the Almighty’s pure goodness created the Voidbringers, but men may choose good without creating evil because as mortals they have a dual nature. Thus the only way for good to increase in the cosmere is for men to create it—in that way, good may come to outweigh evil.” “All right,” she said. “But I don’t buy the explanation about the Voidbringers.” “I thought you were a believer.” “I am. But just because I honor the Almighty doesn’t mean I’m going to accept any explanation, Kabsal. It might be religion, but it still has to make sense.” “Didn’t you once tell me that you didn’t understand your own self?” “Well, yes.” “And yet you expect to be able to understand the exact workings of the Almighty?” She drew her lips into a line. “All right, fine. But I still want to know more about the Voidbringers.” He shrugged as she guided him into an archive room, filled with shelves of books. “I told you the basics, Shallan. The Voidbringers were an embodiment of evil. We fought them off ninety and nine times, led by the Heralds and their chosen knights, the ten orders we call the Knights Radiant. Finally, Aharietiam came, the Last Desolation. The Voidbringers were cast back into the Tranquiline Halls. The Heralds followed to force them out of heaven as well, and Roshar’s Heraldic Epochs ended. Mankind entered the Era of Solitude. The modern era.” “But why is everything from before so fragmented?” “This was thousands and thousands of years ago, Shallan,” Kabsal said. “Before history, before men even knew how to forge steel. We had to be given Shardblades, otherwise we would have had to fight the Voidbringers with clubs.” “And yet we had the Silver Kingdoms and the Knights Radiant.” “Formed and led by the Heralds.” Shallan frowned, counting off rows
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of shelves. She stopped at the correct one, handed her lantern to Kabsal, then walked down the aisle and plucked the biography off the shelf. Kabsal followed her, holding up the lanterns. “There’s more to this,” Shallan said. “Otherwise, Jasnah wouldn’t be digging so hard.” “I can tell you why she’s doing it,” he said. Shallan glanced at him. “Don’t you see?” he said. “She’s trying to prove that the Voidbringers weren’t real. She wants to demonstrate that this was all a fabrication of the Radiants.” He stepped forward and turned to face her, the lanternlight rebounding from the books to either side, making his face pale. “She wants to prove once and for all that the devotaries—and Vorinism—are a gigantic fraud. That’s what this is all about.” “Maybe,” Shallan said thoughtfully. It did seem to fit. What better goal for an avowed heretic? Undermining foolish beliefs and disproving religion? It explained why Jasnah would study something as seemingly inconsequential as the Voidbringers. Find the right evidence in the historical records, and Jasnah might well be able to prove herself right. “Haven’t we been scourged enough?” Kabsal said, eyes angry. “The ardents are no threat to her. We’re not a threat to anyone these days. We can’t own property…Damnation, we’re property ourselves. We dance to the whims of the citylords and warlords, afraid to tell them the truths of their sins for fear of retribution. We’re whitespines without tusks or claws, expected to sit at our master’s feet and offer praise. Yet this is real. It’s all real, and they ignore us and—” He cut off suddenly, glancing at her, lips tight, jaw clenched. She’d never seen such fervor, such fury from the pleasant ardent. She wouldn’t have thought him capable of it. “I’m sorry,” he said, turning from her, leading the way back down the aisle. “It’s all right,” she said, hurrying after him, suddenly feeling depressed. Shallan had expected to find something grander, something more mysterious, behind Jasnah’s secretive research. Could it all really just be about proving Vorinism false? They walked in silence out to the balcony. And there, she realized she had to tell him. “Kabsal, I’m leaving.” He looked at her, surprised. “I’ve had news from my family,” she said. “I can’t speak of it, but I can stay no longer.” “Something about your father?” “Why? Have you heard something?” “Only that he’s been reclusive lately. More than normal.” She suppressed a flinch. News had gotten this far? “I’m sorry to go so suddenly.” “You’ll return?” “I don’t know.” He looked into her eyes, searching. “Do you know when you’ll be leaving?” he said in a suddenly cool voice. “Tomorrow morning.” “Well then,” he said. “Will you at least do me the honor of sketching me? You’ve never given me a likeness, though you’ve done many of the other ardents.” She started, realizing that was true. Despite their time together, she’d never done a sketch of Kabsal. She raised her freehand to her mouth. “I’m sorry!” He seemed taken aback. “I didn’t mean it bitterly, Shallan. It’s
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really not that important—” “Yes it is,” she said, grabbing his hand, towing him along the walkway. “I left my drawing things up above. Come on.” She hurried him to the lift, instructing the parshmen to carry them up. As the lift began to rise, Kabsal looked at her hand in his. She dropped it hastily. “You’re a very confusing woman,” he said stiffly. “I warned you.” She held the retrieved book close to her breast. “I believe you said you had me figured out.” “I rescind that statement.” He looked at her. “You’re really leaving?” She nodded. “I’m sorry. Kabsal…I’m not what you think I am.” “I think you’re a beautiful, intelligent woman.” “Well, you have the woman part right.” “Your father is sick, isn’t he?” She didn’t answer. “I can see why you’d want to return to be with him,” Kabsal said. “But surely you won’t abandon your wardship forever. You’ll be back with Jasnah.” “And she won’t be staying in Kharbranth forever. She’s been moving from place to place almost constantly for the last two years.” He looked ahead, staring out the front of the lift as they rose. Soon, they had to transfer to another lift to carry them up the next group of floors. “I shouldn’t have been spending time with you,” he finally said. “The senior ardents think I’m too distracted. They never like it when one of us starts looking outside the ardentia.” “Your right to court is protected.” “We’re property. A man’s rights can be protected at the same time that he is discouraged from exercising them. I’ve avoided work, I’ve disobeyed my superiors…In courting you, I’ve also courted trouble.” “I didn’t ask you for any of that.” “You didn’t discourage me.” She had no response for that, other than to feel a rising worry. A hint of panic, a desire to run away and hide. During her years of near-solitude on her father’s estate, she had never dreamed of a relationship like this one. Is that what this is? she thought, panic swelling. A relationship? Her intentions in coming to Kharbranth had seemed so straightforward. How had she gotten to the point where she risked breaking a man’s heart? And, to her shame, she admitted to herself that she would miss the research more than Kabsal. Was she a horrible person for feeling that way? She was fond of him. He was pleasant. Interesting. He looked at her, and there was longing in his eyes. He seemed…Stormfather, he seemed to really be in love with her. Shouldn’t she be falling in love with him too? She didn’t think she was. She was just confused. When they reached the top of the Palanaeum’s system of lifts, she practically ran out into the Veil. Kabsal followed, but they needed another lift up to Jasnah’s alcove, and soon she found herself trapped with him once more. “I could come,” Kabsal said softly. “Return with you to Jah Keved.” Shallan’s panic increased. She barely knew him. Yes, they had chatted frequently, but rarely about the important things.
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If he left the ardentia, he’d be demoted to tenth dahn, almost as low as a darkeyes. He’d be without money or house, in almost as bad a position as her family. Her family. What would her brothers say if she brought a virtual stranger back with her? Another man to become part of their problems, privy to their secrets? “I can see from your expression that it’s not an option,” Kabsal said. “It seems that I’ve misinterpreted some very important things.” “No, it’s not that,” Shallan said quickly. “It’s just…Oh, Kabsal. How can you expect to make sense of my actions when even I can’t make sense of them?” She touched his arm, turning him toward her. “I have been dishonest with you. And with Jasnah. And, most infuriatingly, with myself. I’m sorry.” He shrugged, obviously trying to feign nonchalance. “At least I’ll get a sketch. Won’t I?” She nodded as the lift finally shuddered to a halt. She walked down the dark hallway, Kabsal following with the lanterns. Jasnah looked up appraisingly as Shallan entered their alcove, but did not ask why she’d taken so long. Shallan found herself blushing as she gathered her drawing tools. Kabsal hesitated in the doorway. He’d left a basket of bread and jam on the desk. The top of it was still wrapped with a cloth; Jasnah hadn’t touched it, though he always offered her some as a peace offering. Without jam, since Jasnah hated it. “Where should I sit?” Kabsal asked. “Just stand there,” Shallan said, sitting down, propping her sketchpad against her legs and holding it still with her covered safehand. She looked up at him, leaning with one hand against the doorframe. Head shaved, light grey robe draped around him, sleeves short, waist tied with a white sash. Eyes confused. She blinked, taking a Memory, then began to sketch. It was one of the most awkward experiences of her life. She didn’t tell Kabsal that he could move, and so he held the pose. He didn’t speak. Perhaps he thought it would spoil the picture. Shallan found her hand shaking as she sketched, though—thankfully—she managed to hold back tears. Tears, she thought, doing the final lines of the wall around Kabsal. Why should I cry? I’m not the one who just got rejected. Can’t my emotions make sense once in a while? “Here,” she said, pulling the page free and holding it up. “It will smudge unless you spray it with lacquer.” Kabsal hesitated, then walked over, taking the picture in reverent fingers. “It’s wonderful,” he whispered. He looked up, then hurried to his lantern, opening it and pulling out the garnet broam inside. “Here,” he said, proffering it. “Payment.” “I can’t take that! For one thing, it’s not yours.” As an ardent, anything Kabsal carried would belong to the king. “Please,” Kabsal said. “I want to give you something.” “The picture is a gift,” she said. “If you pay me for it, then I haven’t given you anything.” “Then I’ll commission another,” he said, pressing the glowing sphere into her
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fingers. “I’ll take the first likeness for free, but do another for me, please. One of the two of us together.” She paused. She rarely did sketches of herself. They felt strange to draw. “All right.” She took the sphere, then furtively tucked it into her safepouch, beside her Soulcaster. It was a little odd to carry something so heavy there, but she’d gotten accustomed to the bulge and weight. “Jasnah, do you have a mirror?” she asked. The other woman sighed audibly, obviously annoyed by the distraction. She felt through her things, taking out a mirror. Kabsal fetched it. “Hold it up beside your head,” Shallan said, “so I can see myself.” He walked back over, doing so, looking confused. “Angle it to the side a little,” Shallan said, “all right, there.” She blinked, freezing in her mind the image of her face beside his. “Have a seat. You don’t need the mirror any longer. I just wanted it for reference—it helps me for some reason to place my features into the scene I want to sketch. I’ll put myself sitting beside you.” He sat on the floor, and Shallan began to work, using it to distract herself from her conflicting emotions. Guilt at not feeling as strongly for Kabsal as he did for her, yet sorrow that she wouldn’t be seeing him anymore. And above it all, anxiety about the Soulcaster. Sketching herself in beside him was challenging. She worked furiously, blending the reality of Kabsal sitting and a fiction of herself, in her flower-embroidered dress, sitting with her legs to the side. The face in the mirror became her reference point, and she built her head around it. Too narrow to be beautiful, with hair too light, cheeks dotted with freckles. The Soulcaster, she thought. Being here in Kharbranth with it is a danger. But leaving is dangerous too. Could there be a third option? What if I sent it away? She hesitated, charcoal pencil hovering above the picture. Dared she send the fabrial—packaged, delivered to Tozbek in secret—back to Jah Keved without her? She wouldn’t have to worry about being incriminated if her room or person were searched, though she’d want to destroy all pictures she’d drawn of Jasnah with the Soulcaster. And she wouldn’t risk suspicion by vanishing when Jasnah discovered her Soulcaster didn’t work. She continued her drawing, increasingly withdrawn into her thoughts, letting her fingers work. If she sent the Soulcaster back alone, then she could stay in Kharbranth. It was a golden, tempting prospect, but one that threw her emotions further into a jumbled mess. She’d been preparing herself to leave for so long. What would she do about Kabsal? And Jasnah. Could Shallan really remain here, accepting Jasnah’s freely given tutelage, after what she’d done? Yes, Shallan thought. Yes, I could. The fervency of that emotion surprised her. She would live with the guilt, day by day, if it meant continuing to learn. It was terribly selfish of her, and she was ashamed of it. But she would do it for a little
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longer, at least. She’d have to go back eventually, of course. She couldn’t leave her brothers to face danger alone. They needed her. Selfishness, followed by courage. She was nearly as surprised by the latter as she had been by the former. Neither was something she often associated with who she was. But she was coming to realize that she hadn’t known who she was. Not until she left Jah Keved and everything familiar, everything she’d been expected to be. Her sketching grew more and more fervent. She finished the figures and moved to the background. Quick, bold lines became the floor and the archway behind. A scribbled dark smudge for the side of the desk, casting a shadow. Crisp, thin lines for the lantern sitting on the floor. Sweeping, breezelike lines to form the legs and robes of the creature standing behind— Shallan froze, fingers drawing an unintended line of charcoal, breaking away from the figure she’d sketched directly behind Kabsal. A figure that wasn’t really there, a figure with a sharp, angular symbol hovering above its collar instead of a head. Shallan stood, throwing back her chair, sketchpad and charcoal pencil clutched in the fingers of her freehand. “Shallan?” Kabsal said, standing. She’d done it again. Why? The peace she’d begun to feel during the sketching evaporated in a heartbeat, and her heart started to race. The pressures returned. Kabsal. Jasnah. Her brothers. Decisions, choices, problems. “Is everything all right?” Kabsal said, taking a step toward her. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I—I made a mistake.” He frowned. To the side, Jasnah looked up, brow wrinkled. “It’s all right,” Kabsal said. “Look, let’s have some bread and jam. We can calm down, then you could finish it. I don’t care about a—” “I need to go,” Shallan cut in, feeling suffocated. “I’m sorry.” She brushed past the dumbfounded ardent, hurrying from the alcove, giving a wide berth to the place where the figure stood in her sketch. What was wrong with her? She rushed to the lift, calling for the parshmen to lower her. She glanced over her shoulder. Kabsal stood in the hallway, looking after her. Shallan reached the lift, drawing pad clutched in her hand, her heart racing. Calm yourself, she thought, leaning back against the lift platform’s wooden railing as the parshmen began to take her down. She looked up at the empty landing above her. And found herself blinking, memorizing that scene. She began sketching again. She drew with concise motions, sketchpad held against her safearm. For illumination, she had just two very small spheres at either side, where the taut ropes quivered. She moved without thought, just drawing, staring upward. She looked down at what she had drawn. Two figures stood on the landing above, wearing the too-straight robes, like cloth made from metal. They leaned down, watching her go. She looked up again. The landing was empty. What’s happening to me? she thought with increasing horror. When the lift hit the ground, she scrambled away, her skirt fluttering. She all but ran to the exit
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of the Veil, hesitating beside the doorway, ignoring the master-servants and ardents who gave her confused looks. Where to go? Sweat trickled down the sides of her face. Where to run when you were going mad? She cut into the main cavern’s crowd. It was late afternoon, and the dinner rush had begun—servants pushing dining carts, lighteyes strolling to their rooms, scholars walking with hands behind their backs. Shallan dashed through their midst, her hair coming free of its bun, the hairspike dropping to the rock behind her with a high-pitched clink. Her loose red hair streamed behind. She reached the hallway leading to their rooms, panting, hair askew, and glanced over her shoulder. Amid the flow of traffic she’d left a trail of people looking after her in confusion. Almost against her will, she blinked and took a Memory. She raised her pad again, gripping her charcoal pencil in slick fingers, quickly sketching the crowded cavern scene. Just faint impressions. Men of lines, women of curves, walls of sloping rock, carpeted floor, bursts of light in sphere lanterns on the walls. And five symbol-headed figures in black, too-stiff robes and cloaks. Each had a different symbol, twisted and unfamiliar to her, hanging above a neckless torso. The creatures wove through the crowd unseen. Like predators. Focused on Shallan. I’m just imagining it, she tried to tell herself. I’m overtaxed, too many things weighing on me. Did they represent her guilt? The stress of betraying Jasnah and lying to Kabsal? The things she had done before leaving Jah Keved? She tried to stand there, waiting, but her fingers refused to remain still. She blinked, then started drawing again on a new sheet. She finished with a shaking hand. The figures were almost to her, angular not-heads hanging horrifically where faces should have been. Logic warned that she was overreacting, but no matter what she told herself, she couldn’t believe it. These were real. And they were coming for her. She dashed away, surprising several servants who had been approaching her to offer assistance. She ran, slippered feet sliding on the hallway carpets, eventually reaching the door to Jasnah’s rooms. Sketchpad under her arm, she unlocked it with quivering fingers, then pushed through and slammed it behind her. She locked it again and ran for her chamber. She slammed that door closed too, then turned, backing away. The only light in the room came from the three diamond marks in the large crystal goblet on her nightstand. She got on the bed, then scrambled back as far from the door as she could, until she was against the wall, breathing through her nose with frantic breaths. She still had her sketchpad under her arm, though she’d lost the charcoal. There was more in her nightstand. Don’t do it, she thought. Just sit and calm yourself. She felt a growing chill, a rising terror. She had to know. She scrambled to pull out the charcoal, then blinked and began to sketch her room. Ceiling first. Four straight lines. Down the walls. Lines at the
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corners. Her fingers kept moving, drawing, depicting the pad itself, held before her, safehand shrouded and bracing the pad from behind. And then on. To the beings standing around her—twisted symbols unconnected to their uneven shoulders. Those not-heads had unreal angles, surfaces that melded in weird, impossible ways. The creature at the front was reaching too-smooth fingers toward Shallan. Just inches from the right side of the sketchpad. Oh, Stormfather… Shallan thought, charcoal pencil falling still. The room was empty, yet depicted right in front of her was an image of it crowded full of sleek figures. They were close enough that she should be able to feel them breathing, if they breathed. Was there a chill in the room? Hesitantly—terrified but unable to stop herself—Shallan dropped her pencil and raised her freehand to the right. And felt something. She screamed then, jumping to her feet on her bed, dropping the pad, backing against the wall. Before she could consciously think of what she was doing, she was struggling with her sleeve, trying to get the Soulcaster out. It was the only thing she had resembling a weapon. No, that was stupid. She didn’t know how to use it. She was helpless. Except… Storms! she thought, frantic. I can’t use that. I promised myself. She began the process anyway. Ten heartbeats, to bring forth the fruit of her sin, the proceeds of her most horrific act. She was interrupted midway through by a voice, uncanny yet distinct: What are you? She clutched her hand to her chest, losing her balance on the soft bed, falling to her knees on the rumpled blanket. She put one hand to the side, steadying herself on the nightstand, fingers brushing the large glass goblet that sat there. “What am I?” she whispered. “I’m terrified.” This is true. The bedroom transformed around her. The bed, the nightstand, her sketchpad, the walls, the ceiling—everything seemed to pop, forming into tiny, dark glass spheres. She found herself in a place with a black sky and a strange, small white sun that hung on the horizon, too far away. Shallan screamed as she found herself in midair, falling backward in a shower of beads. Flames hovered nearby, dozens of them, perhaps hundreds. Like the tips of candles floating in the air and moving in the wind. She hit something. An endless dark sea, except it wasn’t wet. It was made of the small beads, an entire ocean of tiny glass spheres. They surged around her, moving in an undulating swell. She gasped, flailing, trying to stay afloat. You want me to change? a warm voice said in her mind, distinct and different from the cold whisper she had heard earlier. It was deep and hollow and conveyed a sense of great age. It seemed to come from her hand, and she realized she was grasping something there. One of the beads. The movement of the ocean of glass threatened to tow her down; she kicked frantically, somehow managing to stay afloat. I’ve been as I am for a great long
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time, the warm voice said. I sleep so much. I will change. Give me what you have. “I don’t know what you mean! Please, help me!” I will change. She felt suddenly cold, as if the warmth were being drawn from her. She screamed as the bead in her fingers flared to sudden warmth. She dropped it just as a shift in the ocean swell towed her under, beads rolling over one another with a soft clatter. She fell back and hit her bed, back in her room. Beside her, the goblet on her nightstand melted, the glass becoming red liquid, dropping the three spheres inside to the nightstand’s flooded top. The red liquid poured over the sides of the nightstand, splashing to the floor. Shallan pulled back, horrified. The goblet had been changed into blood. Her shocked motion thumped the nightstand, shaking it. An empty glass water pitcher had been sitting beside the goblet. Her motion knocked it over, toppling it to the ground. It shattered on the stone floor, splashing the blood. That was a Soulcasting! she thought. She’d changed the goblet into blood, which was one of the Ten Essences. She raised her hand to her head, staring at the red liquid expanding in a pool on her floor. There seemed to be quite a lot of it. She was so bewildered. The voice, the creatures, the sea of glass beads and the dark, cold sky. It had all come upon her so quickly. I Soulcast, she realized again. I did it! Did it have something to do with the creatures? But she’d begun seeing them in her drawings before she’d ever stolen the Soulcaster. How…what…? She looked down at her safehand and the Soulcaster hidden in the pouch inside her sleeve. I didn’t put it on, she thought. Yet I used it anyway. “Shallan?” It was Jasnah’s voice. Just outside Shallan’s room. The princess must have followed her. Shallan felt a spike of terror as she saw a line of blood leaking toward the doorway. It was almost there, and would pass underneath in a heartbeat. Why did it have to be blood? Nauseated, she leaped to her feet, slippers soaking up the red liquid. “Shallan?” Jasnah said, voice closer. “What was that sound?” Shallan looked frantically at the blood, then at the sketchpad, filled with pictures of the strange creatures. What if they did have something to do with the Soulcasting? Jasnah would recognize them. There was a shadow under the door. She panicked, tucking the sketchpad away in her trunk. But the blood, it would condemn her. There was enough that only a life-threatening wound could have created it. Jasnah would see. She’d know. Blood where there should be none? One of the Ten Essences? Jasnah was going to know what Shallan had done! A thought struck Shallan. It wasn’t a brilliant thought, but it was a way out, and it was the only thing that occurred to her. She went to her knees and grabbed a shard of the broken glass pitcher in her safehand,
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through the fabric of her sleeve. She took a breath and pulled up her right sleeve, then used the glass to cut a shallow gash in her skin. In the panic of the moment, it barely even hurt. Blood welled out. As the doorknob turned and the door opened, Shallan dropped the glass shard and lay on her side. She closed her eyes, feigning unconsciousness. The door swung open. Jasnah gasped, immediately calling for help. She rushed to Shallan’s side, grabbing her arm and putting pressure on the wound. Shallan mumbled, as if she were barely conscious, gripping her safepouch—and the Soulcaster inside—with her safehand. They wouldn’t open it, would they? She pulled her arm closer to her chest, cowering silently as more footsteps and calls sounded, servants and parshmen running into the room, Jasnah shouting for more help. This, Shallan thought, will not end well. Kaladin dreamed he was the storm. He raged forward, the stormwall behind him his trailing cape, soaring above a heaving, black expanse. The ocean. His passing churned up a tempest, slamming waves into one another, lifting white caps to be caught in his wind. He approached a dark continent and soared upward. Higher. Higher. He left the sea behind. The vastness of the continent spread out before him, seemingly endless, an ocean of rock. So large, he thought, awed. He hadn’t understood. How could he have? He roared past the Shattered Plains. They looked as if something very large had hit them at the center, sending rippling breaks outward. They too were larger than he’d expected; no wonder nobody had been able to find their way through the chasms. There was a large plateau at the center, but with the darkness and the distance, he could not see much. There were lights, though. Someone lived there. He did see that the eastern side of the plains was very different from the western side, marked by tall, spindly pillars, plateaus that had nearly been worn away. Despite that, he could see a symmetry to the Shattered Plains. From high above, the plains resembled a work of art. In a moment, he was past them, continuing north and west to soar across the Sea of Spears, a shallow inland sea where broken fingers of rock jutted above the water. He passed over Alethkar, catching a glimpse of the great city of Kholinar, built amid formations of rock like fins rising from the stone. Then he turned southward, away from anything he knew. He crested majestic mountains, densely populated at their tips, with villages clustered near vents that emitted steam or lava. The Horneater Peaks? He left them with rain and winds, rumbling down into foreign lands. He passed cities and open plains, villages and twisting waterways. There were many armies. Kaladin passed tents pulled flat against the leeward sides of rock formations, stakes driven into the rock to hold them taut, men hidden inside. He passed hillsides where soldiers huddled in clefts. He passed large wooden wagons, built to house lighteyes while at war. How many wars was
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the world fighting? Was there nowhere that was at peace? He took a path to the southwest, blowing toward a city built in long troughs in the ground that looked like giant claw marks ripped across the landscape. He was over it in a flash, passing a hinterland where the stone itself was ribbed and rippled, like frozen waves of water. The people in this kingdom were dark-skinned, like Sigzil. The land went on and on. Hundreds of cities. Thousands of villages. People with faintly blue veins beneath their skin. A place where the pressure of the approaching highstorm blew water out of spouts in the ground. A city where people lived in gigantic, hollowed-out stalactites hanging beneath a titanic sheltered ridge. Westward he blew. The land was so vast. So enormous. So many different people. It dazzled his mind. War seemed far less prevalent in the West than it was in the East, and that comforted him, but still he was troubled. Peace seemed a scarce commodity in the world. Something drew his attention. Strange flashes of light. He blew toward them at the forefront of the storm. What were those lights? They came in bursts, forming the strangest patterns. Almost like physical things that he could reach out and touch, spherical bubbles of light that vibrated with spikes and troughs. Kaladin crossed a strange city laid out in a triangular pattern, with tall peaks rising like sentries at the corners and center. The flashes of light were coming from a building on the central peak. Kaladin knew he would pass quickly, for as the storm, he could not retreat. Ever westward he blew. He threw open the door with his wind, entering a long hallway with bright red tile walls, mosaic murals that he passed too quickly to make out. He rustled the skirts of tall, golden-haired serving women who carried trays of food or steaming towels. They called in a strange language, perhaps wondering who had left a window unbarred in a highstorm. The flashes of light came from directly ahead. So transfixing. Brushing past a pretty gold-and red-haired woman who huddled frightened in a corner, Kaladin burst through a door. He had one brief glimpse of what lay beyond. A man stood over two corpses. His pale head shaved, his clothing white, the murderer held a long, thin sword in one hand. He looked up from his victims and almost seemed to see Kaladin. He had large Shin eyes. It was too late to see anything more. Kaladin blew out the window, throwing shutters wide and streaking into the night. More cities, mountains, and forests passed in a blur. At his advent, plants curled up their leaves, rockbuds closed their shells, and shrubs withdrew their branches. Before long, he neared the western ocean. CHILD OF TANAVAST. CHILD OF HONOR. CHILD OF ONE LONG SINCE DEPARTED. The sudden voice shook Kaladin; he floundered in the air. THE OOATHPACT WAS SHATTERED. The booming sound made the stormwall itself vibrate. Kaladin hit the ground, separating from the storm. He skidded to
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a stop, feet throwing up sprays of water. Stormwinds crashed into him, but he was enough a part of them that they neither tossed nor shook him. MEN RIDE THE STORMS NO LONGER. The voice was thunder, crashing in the air. THE OOATHPACT IS BROKEN, CHILD OF HONOR. “I don’t understand!” Kaladin screamed into the tempest. A face formed before him, the face he had seen before, the aged face as wide as the sky, its eyes full of stars. ODIUM COMES. MOST DANGEROUS OF ALL THE SIXTEEN. YOU WILL NOW GO. Something blew against him. “Wait!” Kaladin said. “Why is there so much war? Must we always fight?” He wasn’t sure why he asked. The questions simply came out. The storm rumbled, like a thoughtful aged father. The face vanished, shattering into droplets of water. More softly, the voice answered, ODIUM REIGNS. Kaladin gasped as he awoke. He was surrounded by dark figures, holding him down against the hard stone floor. He yelled, old reflexes taking over. Instinctively, he snapped his hands outward to the sides, each grabbing an ankle and jerking to pull two assailants off balance. They cursed, crashing to the ground. Kaladin used the moment to twist while bringing an arm up in a sweep. He knocked free the hands pushing him down, rocked and threw himself forward, lurching into the man directly in front of him. Kaladin rolled over him, tucking and coming up on his feet, free of his captives. He spun, flinging sweat from his brow. Where was his spear? He clutched for the knife at his belt. No knife. No spear. “Storm you, Kaladin!” That was Teft. Kaladin raised a hand to his breast, breathing deliberately, dispelling the strange dream. Bridge Four. He was with Bridge Four. The king’s stormwardens had predicted a highstorm in the early morning hours. “It’s all right,” he said to the cursing, twisting clump of bridgemen who had been holding him down. “What were you doing?” “You tried to go out in the storm,” Moash said accusingly, extricating himself. The only light was a single diamond sphere one of the men had set in the corner. “Ha!” Rock added, standing up and brushing himself off. “Had the door open to the rain, staring out, as if you’d been hit on the head with stone. We had to pull you back. Is not good for you to spend another two weeks sick in bed, eh?” Kaladin calmed himself. The riddens—the quiet rainfall at the trailing end of a highstorm—continued outside, drops sprinkling the roof. “You wouldn’t wake up,” Sigzil said. Kaladin glanced at the Azish man, sitting with his back to the stone wall. He hadn’t tried to hold Kaladin down. “You were having some kind of fever dream.” “I feel just fine,” Kaladin said. That wasn’t quite true; his head ached and he was exhausted. He took a deep breath and threw back his shoulders, trying to force the fatigue away. The sphere in the corner flickered. Then its light faded away, leaving them in darkness. “Storm it!” Moash
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muttered. “That eel Gaz. He’s been giving us dun spheres again.” Kaladin crossed the pitch-black barrack, stepping carefully. His headache faded away as he felt for the door. He pushed it open, letting in the faint light of an overcast morning. The winds were weak, but the rain still fell. He stepped out, and was shortly soaked through. The other bridgemen followed him out, and Rock tossed Kaladin a small chunk of soap. Like most of the others, Kaladin wore only his loincloth, and he lathered himself up in the cold downpour. The soap smelled of oil and was gritty with the sand suspended in it. No sweet, soft soaps for bridgemen. Kaladin tossed the bit of soap to Bisig, a thin bridgeman with an angular face. He took it gratefully—Bisig didn’t say much—and began to lather up as Kaladin let the rain wash the soap from his body and hair. To the side, Rock was using a bowl of water to shave and trim his Horneater beard, long on the sides and covering the cheeks, but clean below the lips and chin. It made an odd counterpoint to his head, which he shaved up the center, from directly above the eyebrows back. He trimmed the rest of his hair short. Rock’s hand was smooth and careful, and he didn’t so much as nick himself. Once finished, he stood up and waved to the men waiting behind him. One by one, he shaved any who wanted it. He occasionally paused to sharpen the razor using his whetstone and leather strop. Kaladin raised his fingers to his own beard. He hadn’t been clean-shaven since he’d been in Amaram’s army, so long ago. He walked forward to join those waiting in line. When Kaladin’s time came, the large Horneater laughed. “Sit, my friend, sit! Is good you have come. Your face is more like scragglebark branches than a proper beard.” “Shave it clean,” Kaladin said, sitting down on the stump. “And I’d rather not have a strange pattern like yours.” “Ha!” Rock said, sharpening his razor. “You are a lowlander, my good friend. Is not right for you to wear a humaka’aban. I would have to thump you soundly if you tried this thing.” “I thought you said fighting was beneath you.” “Is allowed several important exceptions,” Rock said. “Now stop with your talking, unless you wish to be losing a lip.” Rock began by trimming the beard down, then lathered and shaved, starting at the left cheek. Kaladin had never let another shave him before; when he’d first gone to war, he’d been young enough that he’d barely needed to shave at all. He’d grown into doing it himself as he got older. Rock’s touch was deft, and Kaladin didn’t feel any nicks or cuts. In a few minutes, Rock stood back. Kaladin raised his fingers to his chin, touching smooth, sensitive skin. His face felt cold, strange to the touch. It took him back, transformed him—just a little—into the man he had been. Strange, how much difference a shave could make. I
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should have done this weeks ago. The riddens had turned to drizzle, heralding the storm’s last whispers. Kaladin stood up, letting the water wash bits of shorn hair from his chest. Baby-faced Dunny—the last of those waiting—sat down for his turn at being shaven. He hardly needed it at all. “The shave suits you,” a voice said. Kaladin turned to see Sigzil leaning against the wall of the barrack, just under the roof’s overhang. “Your face has strong lines. Square and firm, with a proud chin. We would call it a leader’s face among my people.” “I’m no lighteyes,” Kaladin said, spitting to the side. “You hate them so much.” “I hate their lies,” Kaladin said. “I hate it that I used to believe they were honorable.” “And would you cast them down?” Sigzil asked, sounding curious. “Rule in their place?” “No.” This seemed to surprise Sigzil. To the side, Syl finally appeared, having finished frolicking in the winds of the highstorm. He always worried—just a little—that she’d ride away with them and leave him. “Have you no thirst to punish those who have treated you so?” Sigzil asked. “Oh, I’m happy to punish them,” Kaladin said. “But I have no desire to take their place, nor do I wish to join them.” “I’d join them in a heartbeat,” Moash said, walking up behind. He folded his arms across his lean, well-muscled chest. “If I were in charge, things would change. The lighteyes would work the mines and the fields. They would run bridges and die by Parshendi arrows.” “Won’t happen,” Kaladin said. “But I won’t blame you for trying.” Sigzil nodded thoughtfully. “Have either of you ever heard of the land of Babatharnam?” “No,” Kaladin said, glancing toward the camp. The soldiers were moving about now. More than a few were washing too. “That a funny name for a country, though.” Sigzil sniffed. “Personally, I always thought Alethkar sounded like a ridiculous name. I guess it depends on where you were raised.” “So why bring up Babab…” Moash said. “Babatharnam,” Sigzil said. “I visited there once, with my master. They have very peculiar trees. The entire plant—trunk and all—lies down when a highstorm approaches, as if built on hinges. I was thrown in prison three times during our visit there. The Babath are quite particular about how you speak. My master was quite displeased at the amount he had to pay to free me. Of course, I think they were using any excuse to imprison a foreigner, as they knew my master had deep pockets.” He smiled wistfully. “One of those imprisonments was my fault. The women there, you see, have these patterns of veins that sit shallowly beneath their skin. Some visitors find it unnerving, but I found the patterns beautiful. Almost irresistible…” Kaladin frowned. Hadn’t he seen something like that in his dream? “I bring up Babath because they have a curious system of rule there,” Sigzil continued. “You see, the elderly are given office. The older you are, the more authority you have. Everyone gets a chance to
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