Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive 3)

Why not heal yourself as you did in the vision with Fen? the Stormfather asked. You have Stormlight.

“Cheating,” Dalinar said with a grunt.

Cheating? the Stormfather said. Why in Damnation would that be cheating? You made no oath.

Dalinar smiled to hear a fragment of God cursing. He wondered if the Stormfather was picking up bad habits from him. Ignoring the pain as best he could, Dalinar seized his axe in one hand and stumbled to his feet. Ahead of him, his squad of twelve fought desperately—and poorly—against the frantic enemy assault. They’d backed right to the edge of the cliff. With the towering rock formations all around, this place almost felt like a chasm, though it was considerably more open.

Dalinar wavered, and almost collapsed again. Storm it.

Just heal yourself, the Stormfather said.

“I used to be able to shrug off things like this.” Dalinar looked down at his missing arm. Well, perhaps nothing as bad as this.

You’re old, the Stormfather said.

“Maybe,” Dalinar said, steadying himself, his vision clearing. “But they made a mistake.”

Which is?

“They turned their backs on me.”

Dalinar charged again, wielding the axe in one hand. He dropped two of the enemy, punching through to his men. “Down!” he shouted to them. “We can’t fight them up here. Skid down the incline to that ledge below! We’ll try to find a way to climb down from there!”

He jumped off the cliff and hit the incline in motion. It was a reckless maneuver, but storms, they’d never survive up above. He slid down the stone, staying on his feet as he approached the sheer drop into the valley. A final small ledge of stone gave him a place to lurch to a stop.

Other men slid down around him. He dropped his axe and seized one man, keeping him from falling all the way off the ledge to his doom. He missed two others.

In all, seven men managed to stop around him. Dalinar puffed out, feeling light-headed again, then looked down over the side of their current perch. At least fifty feet to the bottom of the canyon.

His fellows were a broken, ragged group of men, bloodied and afraid. Exhaustionspren shot up nearby, like jets of dust. Above, the wild men clustered around the edge, looking down longingly, like axehounds contemplating the food on the master’s table.

“Storms!” The man Dalinar had saved slumped down. “Storms! They’re dead. Everyone’s dead.” He wrapped his arms around himself.

Looking about him, Dalinar counted only one man besides himself who had kept his weapon. The tourniquet he’d made was letting blood seep out.

“We win this war,” Dalinar said softly.

Several others looked to him.

“We win. I’ve seen it. Our platoon is one of the last still fighting. While we may yet fall, the war itself is being won.”

Above, a figure joined the wild men: a creature a good head taller than the others, with fearsome carapace armor of black and red. Its eyes glowed a deep crimson.

Yes … Dalinar remembered that creature. In this vision before, he’d been left for dead up above. This figure had walked past: a monster from a nightmare, he’d assumed, dredged from his subconscious, similar to the beings he fought on the Shattered Plains. Now he recognized the truth. That was a Voidbringer.

But there had been no Everstorm in the past; the Stormfather confirmed that. So where had those things come from, back during this time?

“Form up,” Dalinar commanded. “Get ready!”

Two of the men listened, scrambling over to him. Honestly, two out of seven was more than he’d expected.

The cliff face shook as if something huge had struck it. And then the stones nearby rippled. Dalinar blinked. Was the blood loss causing his vision to waver? The stone face seemed to shimmer and undulate, like the surface of a pond that had been disturbed.

Someone grabbed the rim of their ledge from below. A figure resplendent in Shardplate—each piece visibly glowing an amber color at its edges despite the daylight—hauled itself onto their ledge. The imposing figure stood even larger than other men wearing Shardplate.

“Flee,” the Shardbearer commanded. “Get your men to the healers.”

“How?” Dalinar asked. “The cliff—”

Dalinar started. The cliff had handholds now.

The Shardbearer pressed his hand against the incline leading up toward the Voidbringer, and again the stone seemed to writhe. Steps formed in the rock, as if it were made of wax that could flow and be shaped. The Shardbearer extended his hand to the side, and a massive, glowing hammer appeared there.

He charged upward toward the Voidbringer.

Dalinar felt the rock, which was firm to his touch. He shook his head, then ushered his men to start climbing down.

The last one looked at the stump of his arm. “How are you going to follow, Malad?”

“I’ll manage,” Dalinar said. “Go.”

The man left. Dalinar was growing more and more fuzzy-headed. Finally, he relented and drew in some Stormlight.

His arm regrew. First the cut healed, then the flesh expanded outward like a budding plant. In moments he wriggled his fingers, awed. He’d shrugged off a lost arm like a stubbed toe. The Stormlight cleared his head, and he took a deep, refreshed breath.

The sounds of fighting came from above, but even craning his neck, he couldn’t see much—though a body did roll down the incline, then slip off the ledge.

“Those are humans,” Dalinar said.

Obviously.

“I never put it together before,” Dalinar said. “There were men who fought for the Voidbringers?”

Some.

“And that Shardbearer I saw? A Herald?”

No. Merely a Stoneward. That Surge that changed the stone is the other you may learn, though it may serve you differently.

Such a contrast. The regular soldiers looked so primitive, but that Surgebinder …

With a shake of his head, Dalinar climbed down, using the handholds in the rock face. Dalinar spotted his fellows joining a large group of soldiers farther down the canyon. Shouts and whoops of joy echoed against the walls from that direction. It was as he vaguely remembered: The war had been won. Only pockets of the enemy still resisted. The larger bulk of the army was starting to celebrate.

“All right,” Dalinar said. “Bring in Navani and Jasnah.” He eventually planned to show this vision to the young emperor of Azir, but first he wanted to prepare. “Put them somewhere close to me, please. Let them keep their own clothing.”

Nearby, two men stopped in place. A mist of glowing Stormlight obscured their forms, and when the mist faded, Navani and Jasnah stood there, wearing havahs.

Dalinar jogged over to them. “Welcome to my madness, ladies.”

Navani turned about, craning her neck to stare up at the tops of the castle-like rock formations. She glanced toward a group of soldiers who limped past, one man helping his wounded companion and calling for Regrowth. “Storms!” Navani whispered. “It feels so real.”

“I did warn you,” Dalinar said. “Hopefully you don’t look too ridiculous back in the rooms.” Though he had become familiar enough with the visions that his body no longer acted out what he was doing in them, that wouldn’t be so for Jasnah, Navani, or any of the monarchs he brought in.

“What is that woman doing?” Jasnah asked, curious.