The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive 1)

The arrows landed.

Murk fell without a sound, four or five arrows striking him, spraying his blood across the stones. Leyten dropped as well, and with him both Adis and Corl. Shafts struck the ground at Kaladin’s feet, shattering, and a good half dozen hit the wood around Kaladin’s head and hands.

Kaladin didn’t know if he’d been hit. He was too flush with energy and alarm. He continued running, screaming, holding the bridge on his shoulders. For some reason, a group of Parshendi archers ahead lowered their bows. He saw their marbled skin, strange reddish or orange helms, and simple brown clothing. They appeared confused.

Whatever the reason, it gained Bridge Four a few precious moments. By the time the Parshendi raised their bows again, Kaladin’s team had reached the chasm. His men fell into line with the other bridge crews—there were only fifteen bridges now. Five had fallen. They closed the gaps as they arrived.

Kaladin screamed for the bridgemen to drop amid another spray of arrows. One sliced open the skin near his ribs, deflecting off the bone. He felt it hit, but didn’t feel any pain. He scrambled around the side of the bridge, helping push. Kaladin’s team slammed the bridge into place as a wave of Alethi arrows distracted the enemy archers.

A troop of cavalry charged across the bridges. The bridgemen were soon forgotten. Kaladin fell to his knees beside the bridge as the others of his crew stumbled away, bloodied and hurt, their part in the battle over.

Kaladin held his side, feeling the blood there. Straight laceration, only about an inch long, not wide enough to be of danger.

It was his father’s voice.

Kaladin panted. He needed to get to safety. Arrows zipped over his head, fired by the Alethi archers.

Some people take lives. Other people save lives.

He wasn’t done yet. Kaladin forced himself to his feet and staggered to where someone lay beside the bridge. It was a bridgeman named Hobber; he had an arrow through the leg. The man moaned, holding his thigh.

Kaladin grabbed him under the arms and pulled him away from the bridge. The man cursed at the pain, dazed, as Kaladin towed him to a cleft behind a small bulge in the rock where Rock and some of the other bridgemen had sought shelter.

After dropping off Hobber—the arrow hadn’t hit any major arteries, and he would be fine for a time yet—Kaladin turned and tried to rush back out onto the battlefield proper. He slipped, however, stumbling in his fatigue. He hit the ground hard, grunting.

Some take lives. Some save lives.

He pushed himself to his feet, sweat dripping from his brow, and scrambled back toward the bridge, his father’s voice in his ears. The next bridgeman he found, a man named Koorm, was dead. Kaladin left the body.

Gadol had a deep wound in the side where an arrow had passed completely through him. His face was covered with blood from a gash on his temple, and he’d managed to crawl a short distance from the bridge. He looked up with frenzied black eyes, orange painspren waving around him. Kaladin grabbed him under the arms and towed him away just before a thundering charge of cavalry trampled the place where he’d been lying.

Kaladin dragged Gadol over to the cleft, noting two more dead. He did a quick count. That made twenty-nine bridgemen, including the dead he’d seen. Five were missing. Kaladin stumbled back out onto the battlefield.

Soldiers had bunched up around the back of the bridge, archers forming at the sides and firing into the Parshendi lines as the heavy cavalry charge—led by Highprince Sadeas himself, virtually indestructible in his Shardplate—tried to push the enemy back.

Kaladin wavered, dizzy, dismayed at the sight of so many men running, shouting, firing arrows and throwing spears. Five bridgemen, probably dead, lost in all of that—

He spotted a figure huddled just beside the chasm lip with arrows flying back and forth over his head. It was Dabbid, one of the bridgemen. He curled up, arm twisted at an awkward angle.

Kaladin charged in. He threw himself to the ground and crawled beneath the zipping arrows, hoping that the Parshendi would ignore a couple of unarmed bridgemen. Dabbid didn’t even notice when Kaladin reached him. He was in shock, lips moving soundlessly, eyes dazed. Kaladin grabbed him awkwardly, afraid to stand up too high lest an arrow hit him.

He dragged Dabbid away from the edge in a clumsy half crawl. He kept slipping on blood, falling, abrading his arms on the rock, hitting his face against the stone. He persisted, towing the younger man out from underneath the flying arrows. Finally, he got far enough away that he risked standing. He tried to pick up Dabbid. But his muscles were so weak. He strained and slipped, exhausted, falling to the stones.

He lay there, gasping, the pain of his side finally washing over him. So tired….

He stood up shakily, then tried again to grab Dabbid. He blinked away tears of frustration, too weak to even pull the man.

“Airsick lowlander,” a voice growled.

Kaladin turned as Rock arrived. The massive Horneater grabbed Dabbid under the arms, pulling him. “Crazy,” he grumbled to Kaladin, but easily lifted the wounded bridgeman and carried him back to the hollow.

Kaladin followed. He collapsed in the hollow, his back to the rock. The surviving bridgemen huddled around him, eyes haunted. Rock set Dabbid down.

“Four more,” Kaladin said between gasps. “We have to find them….”

“Murk and Leyten,” Teft said. The older bridgeman had been near the back this run, and hadn’t taken any wounds. “And Adis and Corl. They were in the front.”

That’s right, Kaladin thought, exhausted. How could I forget…. “Murk is dead,” he said. “The others might live.” He tried to stumble to his feet.

“Idiot,” Rock said. “Stay here. Is all right. I will do this thing.” He hesitated. “Guess I’m an idiot too.” He scowled, but went back out onto the battlefield. Teft hesitated, then chased after him.

Kaladin breathed in and out, holding his side. He couldn’t decide if the pain of the arrow impact hurt more than the cut.

Save lives….

He crawled over to the three wounded. Hobber—with an arrow through the leg—would wait, and Dabbid had only a broken arm. Gadol was the worst off, with that hole in his side. Kaladin stared at the wound. He didn’t have an operating table; he didn’t even have antiseptic. How was he supposed to do anything?

He shoved despair aside. “One of you go fetch me a knife,” he told the bridgemen. “Take it off the body of a soldier who has fallen. Someone else build a fire!”

The bridgemen looked at each other.

“Dunny, you get the knife,” Kaladin said as he held his hand to Gadol’s wound, trying to stanch the blood. “Narm, can you make a fire?”

“With what?” the man asked.

Kaladin pulled off his vest and shirt, then handed the shirt to Narm. “Use this as tinder and gather some fallen arrows for wood. Does anyone have flint and steel?”

Moash did, fortunately. You carried anything valuable you had with you on a bridge run; other bridgemen might steal it if you left it behind.

“Move quickly!” Kaladin said. “Someone else, go rip open a rockbud and get me the watergourd inside.”

They stood for a few moments. Then, blessedly, they did as he demanded. Perhaps they were too stunned to object. Kaladin tore open Gadol’s shirt, exposing the wound. It was bad, terribly bad. If it had cut the intestines or some of the other organs…