Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive 3)

“Follow,” Dalinar said, walking around the Rift on its east side, where the fracture was narrow enough to cross on a short bridge.

Screams below. Then cries of pain. Calls for mercy. People flooded from buildings, shouting in terror, fleeing on walkways and steps toward the basin below. Many buildings burned, trapping others inside.

Dalinar led his squad along the northern rim of the Rift until they reached a certain location. His armies waited here to kill any soldiers who tried to break out, but the enemy had concentrated their assault on the other side, then been mostly beaten back. The fires hadn’t reached up here yet, though Sadeas’s archers had killed several dozen civilians who had tried to flee in this direction.

For now, the wooden ramp down into the city was clear. Dalinar led his group down one level to a location he remembered so well: the hidden door set into the wall. It was metal now, guarded by a pair of nervous Rifter soldiers.

Kadash’s men shot them down with shortbows. That annoyed Dalinar; all of this fighting, and nothing with which to feed the Thrill. He stepped over one of the corpses, then tried the door, which was no longer hidden. It was still locked tight. Tanalan had decided to go with security instead of secrets, this time.

Unfortunately for them, Oathbringer had come home. Dalinar easily cut off the steel hinges. He stepped back as the door slammed forward onto the walkway, shaking the wood.

“Light those,” he said, pointing to the barrels. “Roll them down and burn out anyone hiding inside.”

The men hurried to obey, and soon the tunnel of rock had fitful black smoke pouring from it. Nobody tried to flee, though he thought he heard cries of pain inside. Dalinar watched as long as he could, until soon the smoke and heat drove him back.

The Rift behind him was becoming a pit of darkness and fire. Dalinar retreated up the ramp to the stones above. Archers lit the final walkways and ramps behind him. It would be long before people decided to resettle here. Highstorms were one thing, but there was a more terrible force upon the land. And it carried a Shardblade.

Those screams … Dalinar passed lines of soldiers who waited along the northern rim in silent horror; many wouldn’t have been with Dalinar and Gavilar during the early years of their conquest, when they’d allowed pillaging and ransacking of cities. And for those who did remember … well, he’d often found an excuse to stop things like this before.

He drew his lips to a line, and shoved down the Thrill. He would not let himself enjoy this. That single sliver of decency he could keep back.

“Brightlord!” a soldier said, waving to him. “Brightlord, you must see this!”

Just below the cliff here—one tier down into the city—was a beautiful white building. A palace. Farther out along the walkways, a group of people fought to reach the building. The wooden walkways were on fire, and preventing their access. Shocked, Dalinar recognized Tanalan the younger from their encounter earlier.

Trying to get into his home? Dalinar thought. Figures darkened the building’s upper windows; a woman and children. No. Trying to get to his family.

Tanalan hadn’t been hiding in the saferoom after all.

“Throw a rope,” Dalinar said. “Bring Tanalan up here, but shoot down the bodyguards.”

The smoke billowing out of the Rift was growing thick, lit red by the fires. Dalinar coughed, then stepped back as his men let down a rope to the platform below, a section that wasn’t burning. Tanalan hesitated, then took it, letting Dalinar’s men haul him up. The bodyguards were sent arrows when they tried to climb up a nearby burning ramp.

“Please,” Tanalan said, clothing ashen from the smoke, as he was hauled up over the stone rim. “My family. Please.”

Dalinar could hear them screaming below. He whispered an order, and his elites pushed back the regular Kholin troops from the area, opening up a wide half-circle against the burning rift, where only Dalinar and his closest men were able to observe the captive.

Tanalan slumped on the ground. “Please…”

“I,” Dalinar said softly, “am an animal.”

“What—”

“An animal,” Dalinar said, “reacts as it is prodded. You whip it, and it becomes savage. With an animal, you can start a tempest. Trouble is, once it’s gone feral, you can’t just whistle it back to you.”

“Blackthorn!” Tanalan screamed. “Please! My children.”

“I made a mistake years ago,” Dalinar said. “I will not be so foolish again.”

And yet … those screams.

Dalinar’s soldiers seized Tanalan tightly as Dalinar turned from the man and walked back to the pit of fire. Sadeas had just arrived with a company of his own men, but Dalinar ignored them, Oathbringer still held against his shoulder. Smoke stung Dalinar’s nose, his eyes watering. He couldn’t see across the Rift to the rest of his armies; the air warped with heat, colored red.

It was like looking into Damnation itself.

Dalinar released a long breath, suddenly feeling his exhaustion even more deeply. “It is enough,” he said, turning toward Sadeas. “Let the rest of the people of the city escape out the mouth of the canyon below. We have sent our signal.”

“What?” Sadeas said, hiking over. “Dalinar—”

A loud series of cracks interrupted him. An entire section of the city nearby collapsed into the flames. The palace—and its occupants—crashed down with it, a tempest of sparks and splintering wood.

“No!” Tanalan shouted. “NO!”

“Dalinar…” Sadeas said. “I prepared a battalion below, with archers, per your orders.”

“My orders?”

“You said to ‘Kill anyone who comes out of the city and leave their bodies to rot.’ I had men stationed below; they’ve launched arrows in at the city struts, burned the walkways leading down. This city burns from both directions—from underneath and from above. We can’t stop it now.”

Wood cracked as more sections of city collapsed. The Thrill surged, and Dalinar pushed it away. “We’ve gone too far.”

“Nonsense! Our lesson won’t mean much if people can merely walk away.” Sadeas glanced toward Tanalan. “Last loose end is this one. We don’t want him getting away again.” He reached for his sword.

“I’ll do it,” Dalinar said. Though the concept of more death was starting to sicken him, he steeled himself. This was the man who had betrayed him.

Dalinar stepped closer. To his credit, Tanalan tried to leap to his feet and fight. Several elites shoved the traitor back down to the ground, though Captainlord Kadash himself was just standing at the side of the city, looking down at the destruction. Dalinar could feel that heat, so terrible. It mirrored a sense within him. The Thrill … incredibly … was not satisfied. Still it thirsted. It didn’t seem … didn’t seem it could be satiated.

Tanalan collapsed, blubbering.

“You should not have betrayed me,” Dalinar whispered, raising Oathbringer. “At least this time, you didn’t hide in your hole. I don’t know who you let take cover there, but know they are dead. I took care of that with barrels of fire.”

Tanalan blinked, then started laughing with a frantic, crazed air. “You don’t know? How could you not know? But you killed our messengers. You poor fool. You poor, stupid fool.”