Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive 3)

Kaladin growled and dashed along the inside wall of the tower, pulled himself up past the table, then hurled himself out a window.

He crashed into the Voidbringer in midair, shoving the creature’s lance to the side.

“Leave. My. Men. Alone!”

Kaladin clung to the clothing of the monster, spinning in the air dozens of feet above the dark city, sparkling with the light of spheres in windows or lanterns. The Voidbringer Lashed them higher, falsely assuming that the more height it had, the more advantage it would gain over Kaladin.

Holding tightly with his left hand, wind whipping around them, Kaladin reached out with his right hand and summoned Syl as a long knife. She appeared immediately, and Kaladin shoved the diminutive Shardblade into the creature’s stomach.

The Voidbringer grunted and looked at him with deep, glowing red eyes. It dropped its lance and began to claw at Kaladin while spinning itself in the air, trying to throw him free.

They can survive wounds, Kaladin thought, gritting his teeth as the thing gripped at his neck. Like Radiants. That Voidlight sustains them.

Kaladin still refrained from drawing in his own Stormlight. He suffered the Fused’s Lashings as it spun them in the air, shouting in a language Kaladin didn’t understand. He tried to maneuver the Shardknife and cut the thing’s spine. The weapon was insanely sharp, but for the moment, leverage and disorientation were bigger factors.

The Voidbringer grunted, then Lashed itself—with Kaladin hanging on—back downward toward the wall. They fell quickly, a double or triple Lashing, spiraling and screaming toward the wall walk.

Kaladin! Syl’s voice, in his head. I sense something … something about its power. Cut upward, toward the heart.

The city, the battle, the sky—all became a blur. Kaladin forced his Blade farther into the creature’s chest, pushing it upward, seeking …

The Shardknife struck something brittle and hard.

The Fused’s red eyes winked out.

Kaladin twisted, putting the corpse beneath him and the wall walk. They hit hard, and he bounced off the corpse, then hit the stones with a crack. He groaned, eyes flashing with pain, and was forced—by instinct—to take in a breath of Stormlight to heal the damage of the fall.

That Light flowed through him, reknitting bones, repairing organs. It was used up in a moment, and he forced himself not to draw in more, instead pushing himself up and shaking his head.

The Voidbringer stared sightlessly from the wall walk beside him. It was dead.

Ahead, the other Fused began streaking away in retreat, leaving a broken and battered group of guards. Kaladin stumbled to his feet; his section of the wall was empty, save for the dead and the dying. He didn’t recognize any; he’d hit the wall some fifty feet away from his platoon’s position.

Syl landed on his shoulder and patted him on the side of the head. Painspren littered the wall, crawling this way and that, in the shape of hands without skin.

This city is doomed, Kaladin thought as he knelt by one of the wounded and quickly prepared a bandage by slicing up a fallen cloak. Storms. We might all be doomed. We’re not anywhere near ready to fight these things.

It looked like Noro’s squad, at least, had survived. They jogged down the wall and gathered around the Voidbringer Kaladin had killed, nudging it with the butts of their pikes. Kaladin tied off a tourniquet, then moved to another man, whose head he wrapped.

Soon, army surgeons flooded the wall. Kaladin stepped back, bloodied—but more angry than tired. He turned to Noro, Beard, and the others, who had gathered around him.

“You killed one,” Beard said, feeling at his arm with the empty glyphward. “Storms. You actually killed one, Kal.”

“How many have you brought down?” Kaladin asked, realizing that he’d never asked. “How many has the Wall Guard killed during the assaults these last weeks?”

His men shared glances.

“Azure drove a few off,” Noro said. “They’re afraid of her Shardblade. But as for Voidbringers killed … this would be the first, Kal.”

Storms. Even worse, the one he’d killed would be reborn. Unless the Heralds set up their prison again, Kaladin couldn’t ever really kill one of the Fused.

“I need to talk to Azure,” he said, striding down the wall walk. “Noro, report.”

“None fallen, sir, though Vaceslv took a gash to the chest. He’s with the surgeons, and should pull through.”

“Good. Squad, you’re with me.”

He found Azure surveying the Eighth Platoon’s losses near their guard tower. She had her cloak off and held oddly in one hand, wrapped around her forearm, with part of it draping down below. Her unsheathed Shardblade glittered, long and silvery.

Kaladin stepped up to her, the sleeve of his uniform stained dark with the blood of the Voidbringer he’d killed. Azure looked tired, and she gestured with her sword outward. “Have a look.”

Lights lit the horizon. Sphere lights. Thousands upon thousands of them—far more than he’d seen on previous nights. They blanketed the landscape.

“That’s the entire enemy army,” Azure said. “I’d bet my red life on it. Somehow, they marched them through that storm earlier today. It won’t be long now. They’ll have to attack before the next highstorm. A few days at most.”

“I need to know what’s going on here, Azure,” Kaladin said. “How are you getting food for this army?”

She drew her lips to a line.

“He killed one, Highmarshal,” Beard whispered from behind him. “Storms … he took one of them down. Grabbed on like he was mounting a storming horse, then rode the bastard through the sky.”

The woman studied him, and reluctantly Kaladin summoned Syl as a Shardblade. Noro’s eyes bulged, and Ved nearly fainted—though Beard just grinned.

“I’m here,” Kaladin said, resting the Sylblade on his shoulder, “on orders from King Elhokar and the Blackthorn. It’s my job to save Kholinar. And it’s time you started talking to me.”

She smiled at him. “Come with me.”

Ba-Ado-Mishram has somehow Connected with the parsh people, as Odium once did. She provides Voidlight and facilitates forms of power. Our strike team is going to imprison her.

—From drawer 30-20, fourth emerald

Grund wasn’t at his normal spot inside the corner of the broken shop.

The place hadn’t fared well during the Everstorm; the ceiling was sagging even more, and a snarl of tree branches had been blown in through the window, littering the floor. Veil frowned, calling his name. After fleeing the Oathgate platform, she’d met up with Vathah, who had been waiting as instructed.

She’d sent Vathah back to report to the king, and probably should have gone herself. But she hadn’t been able to shake the eerie disquiet of her trip through the revel. Going back home would have left her too much time to think.

Veil wanted to be out working instead. Monsters and Voidbringers were something she couldn’t comprehend, but starving children … she could do something about that. She’d taken the two remaining sacks of food and gone to help the city’s people.

If she could find them.

“Grund?” Veil repeated, leaning farther in through the window. Before, he’d always been up at this time. Perhaps he’d finally moved out of the building, like all the others had. Or maybe he hadn’t gotten back from the stormshelter yet, following the Everstorm.