“They’re wrong.” Dalinar had seen it, these months living with Gavilar. His brother had not grown soft. He was still as eager for conquest as ever; he simply approached it differently. The clash of words, the maneuvering of princedoms into positions where they were forced to obey.
The fire’s embers seemed to pulse like a heartbeat. “Do you ever wonder about the time when this kingdom was truly great, Dalinar?” Gavilar asked. “When people looked to the Alethi. When kings sought their advice. When we were … Radiant.”
“Traitors,” Dalinar said.
“Does the act of a single generation negate many generations of domination? We revere the Sunmaker when his reign lasted but the blink of an eye—yet we ignore the centuries the Radiants led. How many Desolations did they defend mankind?”
“Um…” The ardents talked about this in prayers, didn’t they? He tried a guess. “Ten?”
“A meaningless number,” Gavilar said, waving his fingers. “The histories just say ‘ten’ because it sounds significant. Either way, I have failed in my diplomatic efforts.” He turned toward Dalinar. “It is time to show the kingdom that we are not soft, Brother.”
Oh no. Hours ago, he would have leaped in excitement. But after seeing that child …
You’ll be anxious again in a few days, Dalinar told himself. A man can’t change in a moment.
“Gavilar,” he whispered, “I’m worried.”
“You’re still the Blackthorn, Dalinar.”
“I’m not worried about whether I can win battles.” Dalinar stood, throwing back his chair in his haste. He found himself pacing. “I’m like an animal, Gavilar. Did you hear about the bar fight? Storms. I can’t be trusted around people.”
“You are what the Almighty made you.”
“I’m telling you, I’m dangerous. Sure, I can crush this little rebellion, bathe Oathbringer in some blood. Great. Wonderful. Then what? I come back here and lock myself in a cage again?”
“I … might have something that will help.”
“Bah. I’ve tried living a quiet life. I can’t live through endless politics, like you can. I need more than just words!”
“You’ve merely been trying to restrain yourself—you’ve tried casting out the bloodthirst, but you haven’t replaced it with anything else. Go do what I command, then return and we can discuss further.”
Dalinar stopped near his brother, then took a single purposeful step into his shadow. Remember this. Remember you serve him. He would never return to that place that had almost led him to attack this man.
“When do I ride for the Rift?” Dalinar asked.
“You don’t.”
“But you just said—”
“I’m sending you to battle, but not against the Rift. Our kingdom suffers threats from abroad. There is a new dynasty threatening us from Herdaz; a Reshi house has gained power there. And the Vedens have been raiding Alethkar in the southwest. They’re claiming it’s bandits, but the forces are too organized. It’s a test to see how we react.”
Dalinar nodded slowly. “You want me to go fight on our borders. Remind everyone we’re still capable of employing the sword.”
“Exactly. This is a dangerous time for us, Brother. The highprinces question. Is a united Alethkar worth the trouble? Why bow before a king? Tanalan is the manifestation of their questions, but he has been careful not to stray into outright rebellion. If you attack him, the other highprinces could unite behind the rebels. We could shatter the kingdom and have to start all over.
“I will not allow that. I will have a unified Alethkar. Even if I have to hit the highprinces so hard, they are forced to melt together from the heat of it. They need to remember that. Go to Herdaz first, then Jah Keved. Remind everyone why they fear you.”
Gavilar met Dalinar’s eyes. No … he was not soft. He thought like a king now. He sought the long term, but Gavilar Kholin was as determined as ever.
“It will be done,” Dalinar said. Storms, this day had been a tempest of emotion. Dalinar stalked toward the door. He wanted to see the child again.
“Brother?” Gavilar said.
Dalinar turned back and regarded Gavilar, who was bathed by the bleeding light of a fire reaching its end.
“Words are important,” Gavilar said. “Much more than you give them credit for being.”
“Perhaps,” Dalinar said. “But if they were all-powerful, you wouldn’t need my sword, would you?”
“Perhaps. I can’t help feeling words would be enough, if only I knew the right ones to say.”
We also instruct that you should not return to Obrodai. We have claimed that world, and a new avatar of our being is beginning to manifest there.
She is young yet, and—as a precaution—she has been instilled with an intense and overpowering dislike of you.
To Dalinar, flying felt much like being on a ship in the ocean.
There was something profoundly disconcerting about being out on the ocean, subject to the winds and currents. Men didn’t control the waves, they merely set out and prayed that the ocean didn’t decide to consume them.
Flying alongside Captain Kaladin provoked some of the same emotions in Dalinar. On one hand, the view over the Shattered Plains was magnificent. He felt he could almost see the pattern to it that Shallan mentioned.
On the other hand, this kind of travel was deeply unnatural. Winds buffeted them, and if you moved your hands or arched your back in the wrong way, you were sent in a different direction from everyone else. Kaladin had to constantly zip back and forth, righting one of them that got blown off-course. And if you looked down, and paused to consider exactly how high up you were …
Well, Dalinar was not a timid man, but he was still glad of Navani’s hand in his.
On his other side flew Elhokar, and beyond him were Kadash and a pretty young ardent who served as one of Navani’s scholars. The five of them were escorted by Kaladin and ten of his squires. The Windrunners had been training steadily for three weeks now, and Kaladin had finally—after practicing by flying groups of soldiers back and forth to the warcamps—agreed to treat Dalinar and the king to a similar trip.
It is like being on a ship, Dalinar thought. What would it feel like to be up here during a highstorm? That was how Kaladin planned to get Elhokar’s team to Kholinar—fly them at the leading edge of a storm, so his Stormlight was continually renewed.
You’re thinking of me, the Stormfather sent. I can feel it.
“I’m thinking of how you treat ships,” Dalinar whispered, his physical voice lost to the winds—yet his meaning carried, unhampered, to the Stormfather.
Men should not be upon the waters during a storm, he replied. Men are not of the waves.
“And the sky? Are men of the sky?”
Some are. He said this grudgingly.
Dalinar could only imagine how terrible it must be to be a sailor out at sea during a storm. He had taken only short coastwise trips by ship.
No, wait, he thought. There was one, of course. A trip to the Valley …
He barely remembered that voyage, though he could not blame that solely upon the Nightwatcher.
Captain Kaladin swooped over. He was the only one who seemed truly in control of his flying. Even his men flew more like dropped rocks than skyeels. They lacked his finesse, his control. Though the others could help if something went wrong, Kaladin had been the only one Lashing Dalinar and the others. He said he wanted practice, for the eventual flight to Kholinar.