Words of Radiance (The Stormlight Archive 2)

“I will draft a letter to Helaran,” Shallan said. “We need to warn him about Father’s assassins, and we can ask him to take the three of you in.”

“You shouldn’t have to do this, small one,” Balat said, head down. “I’m the eldest after Helaran. I should have been able to stop Father by now. Somehow.”

“Take Malise away,” Shallan said. “That will be doing enough.”

He nodded.

Shallan returned to the house, passing Father mulling over his disobedient family, and fetched some things from the kitchen. Then she returned to the steps and looked upward. Taking a few deep breaths, she went over what she would say to the guards if they stopped her. Then she raced up them and opened the door into her father’s sitting room.

“Wait,” the hallway guard said. “He left orders. Nobody in or out.”

Shallan’s throat tightened, and even with her practice, she stammered as she spoke. “I just talked to him. He wants me to speak with her.”

The guard inspected her, chewing on something. Shallan felt her confidence wilt, heart racing. Confrontation. She was as much a coward as Balat.

He gestured to the other guard, who went downstairs to check. He eventually returned, nodding, and the first man reluctantly waved for her to continue. Shallan entered.

Into the Place.

She had not entered this room in years. Not since…

Not since…

She raised a hand, shading her eyes against the light coming from behind the painting. How could Father sleep in here? How was it that nobody else looked, nobody else cared? That light was blinding.

Fortunately, Malise was curled in an easy chair facing that wall, so Shallan could put her back to the painting and obstruct the light. She rested a hand on her stepmother’s arm.

She didn’t feel that she knew Malise, despite years living together. Who was this woman who would marry a man everyone whispered had killed his previous wife? Malise oversaw Shallan’s education—meaning she searched for new tutors each time the women fled—but Malise herself couldn’t do much to teach Shallan. One could not teach what one did not know.

“Mother?” Shallan asked. She used the word.

Malise looked. Despite the blazing light of the room, Shallan saw the woman’s lip was split and bleeding. She cradled her left arm. Yes, it was broken.

Shallan took out the gauze and cloth she had fetched from the kitchen, then began to wipe down the wounds. She would have to find something to use as a splint for that arm.

“Why doesn’t he hate you?” Malise said harshly. “He hates everyone else but you.”

Shallan dabbed at the woman’s lip.

“Stormfather, why did I come to this cursed household?” Malise shuddered. “He’ll kill us all. One by one, he’ll break us and kill us. There’s a darkness inside of him. I’ve seen it, behind his eyes. A beast…”

“You’re going to leave,” Shallan said softly.

Malise barked a laugh. “He’ll never let me go. He never lets go of anything.”

“You’re not going to ask,” Shallan whispered. “Balat is going to run and join Helaran, who has powerful friends. He’s a Shardbearer. He’ll protect the both of you.”

“We’ll never reach him,” Malise said. “And if we do, why would Helaran take us in? We have nothing.”

“Helaran is a good man.”

Malise twisted in her seat, staring away from Shallan, who continued her ministrations. The woman whimpered when Shallan bound her arm, but wouldn’t respond to questions. Finally, Shallan gathered up the bloodied cloths to throw away.

“If I go,” Malise whispered, “and Balat with me, who will he hate? Who will he hit? Maybe you, finally? The one who actually deserves it?”

“Maybe,” Shallan whispered, then left.

66. Stormblessings

Is not the destruction we have wrought enough? The worlds you now tread bear the touch and design of Adonalsium. Our interference so far has brought nothing but pain.

Feet scraped on the stone outside of Kaladin’s cage. One of the jailers checking on him again. Kaladin continued to lie motionless with closed eyes, and did not look.

In order to keep the darkness at bay, he had begun planning. What would he do when he got out? When he got out. He had to tell himself that forcibly. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust Dalinar. His mind, though… his mind betrayed him, and whispered things that were not true.

Distortions. In his state, he could believe that Dalinar lied. He could believe that the highprince secretly wanted Kaladin in prison. Kaladin was a terrible guard, after all. He’d failed to do anything about the mysterious countdowns scrawled on walls, and he’d failed to stop the Assassin in White.

With his mind whispering lies, Kaladin could believe that Bridge Four was happy to be rid of him—that they pretended they wanted to be guards, just to make him happy. They secretly wanted to go on with their lives, lives they’d enjoy, without Kaladin spoiling them.

These untruths should have seemed ridiculous to him. They didn’t.

Clink.

Kaladin snapped his eyes open, growing tense. Had they come to take him, to execute him, as the king wished? He leaped to his feet, coming down in a battle stance, the empty bowl from his meal held to throw.

The jailer at the cell door stepped back, eyes widening. “Storms, man,” he said. “I thought you were asleep. Well, your time is served. King signed a pardon today. They didn’t even strip your rank or position.” The man rubbed his chin, then pulled the cell door open. “Guess you’re lucky.”

Lucky. People always said that about Kaladin. Still, the prospect of freedom forced away the darkness inside of him, and Kaladin approached the door. Wary. He stepped out, the guard backing away.

“You are a distrustful one, aren’t you?” the jailer said. A lighteyes of low rank. “Guess that makes you a good bodyguard.” The man gestured for Kaladin to leave the room first.

Kaladin waited.

Finally, the guard sighed. “Right, then.” He walked out the doorway into the hall beyond.

Kaladin followed, and with each step felt himself traveling back a few days in time. Shut the darkness away. He wasn’t a slave. He was a soldier. Captain Kaladin. He’d survived this… what had it been? Two, three weeks? This short time back in a cage.

He was free now. He could return to his life as a bodyguard. But one thing… one thing had changed.

Nobody will ever, ever, do this to me again. Not king or general, not brightlord or brightlady.

He would die first.

They passed a leeward window, and Kaladin stopped to breathe in the cool, fresh scent of open air. The window gave an ordinary, mundane view of the camp outside, but it seemed glorious. A small breeze stirred his hair, and he let himself smile, reaching a hand to his chin. Several weeks’ growth. He’d have to let Rock shave that.

“Here,” the jailer said. “He’s free. Can we finally be done with this farce, Your Highness?”

“Your Highness”? Kaladin turned down the hallway to where the guard had stopped at another cell—one of the larger ones set into the hallway itself. Kaladin had been put in the deepest cell, away from the windows.