He focused on the steps. One after another.
Momentum. A fight was all about momentum.
He didn’t dare take the obvious route, in case he encountered more Rifters. He crossed through the wilderness, vines writhing beneath his feet and rockbuds sprouting after he passed.
The Thrill returned to urge him on. For this walk was a fight. A battle. Night fell, and he threw off his last piece of Shardplate, leaving only the neck brace. They could regrow the rest of it from that, if they had to.
Keep. Moving.
In that darkness, shadowed figures seemed to accompany him. Armies made of red mist at the corners of his vision, charging forces that fell to dust and then sprouted from shadow again, like surging ocean waves in a constant state of disintegration and rebirth. Not just men, but eyeless horses. Animals locked in struggle, stifling the life from one another. Shadows of death and conflict to propel him through the night.
He hiked for an eternity. Eternity was nothing when time had no meaning. He was actually surprised when he approached the light of the Rift, from torches held by soldiers on the walls. His navigation by the moons and stars had been successful.
He stalked through the darkness toward his own camp on the field. There was another army here. Sadeas’s actual soldiers; they’d arrived ahead of schedule. Another few hours, and Tanalan’s ploy wouldn’t have worked.
Dalinar dragged Oathbringer behind him; it made a soft scraping sound as it cut a line in the stone. He numbly heard soldiers talking by the bonfire ahead, and one called something out. Dalinar ignored them, each step relentless, as he passed into their light. A pair of young soldiers in blue crowed their challenges until cutting off and lowering spears, gaping.
“Stormfather,” one of them said, stumbling back. “Kelek and the Almighty himself!”
Dalinar continued through camp. Noise stirred at his passing, men crying of visions of the dead and of Voidbringers. He made for his command tent. The eternity it took to get there seemed the same length as the others. How could he cross so many miles in the same time as it took to go the few feet to a simple tent? Dalinar shook his head, seeing red at the sides of his vision.
Words broke through the canvas of the tent. “Impossible. The men are spooked. They … No, it’s simply not possible.”
The flaps burst apart, revealing a man with fine clothing and wavy hair. Sadeas gaped, then stumbled to the side, holding the flap for Dalinar, who did not break stride. He walked straight in, Oathbringer slicing a ribbon in the ground.
Inside, generals and officers gathered by the grim light of a few sphere lanterns. Evi, comforted by Brightness Kalami, was weeping, though Ialai studied the table full of maps. All eyes turned toward Dalinar.
“How?” Teleb asked. “Blackthorn? We sent a team of scouts to inform you as soon as Tanalan turned on us and cast our soldiers off his walls. Our force reported all men lost, an ambush…”
Dalinar hefted Oathbringer and slammed it down into the stone ground beside him, then sighed at finally being able to release the burden. He placed his palms on the sides of the battle table, hands crusted in blood. His arms were covered in it too.
“You sent the same scouts,” he whispered, “who first spied on the caravan, and reported seeing a Shardbearer leading it?”
“Yes,” Teleb said.
“Traitors,” Dalinar said. “They’re working with Tanalan.” He couldn’t have known that Dalinar would parley with him. Instead, the man had somehow bribed away members of the army, and had intended to use their reports to coax Dalinar into a hurried ride to the south. Into a trap.
It had all been set in motion before Dalinar had spoken to Tanalan. Planned well in advance.
Teleb barked out orders for the scouts to be imprisoned. Dalinar leaned down over the battle maps on the table. “This is a map for a siege,” he whispered.
“We…” Teleb looked to Sadeas. “We figured that the king would want time to come down himself. To, um, avenge you, Brightlord.”
“Too slow,” Dalinar said, his voice ragged.
“Highprince Sadeas proposed … another option,” Teleb said. “But the king—”
Dalinar looked to Sadeas.
“They used my name to betray you,” Sadeas said, then spat to the side. “We will suffer rebellions like this time and time again unless they fear us, Dalinar.”
Dalinar nodded slowly. “They must bleed,” he whispered. “I want them to suffer for this. Men, women, children. They must know the punishment for broken oaths. Immediately.”
“Dalinar?” Evi stood up. “Husband?” She stepped forward, toward the table.
Then he turned toward her, and she stopped. Her unusual, pale Westerner skin grew even more starkly white. She stepped backward, pulling her hands toward her chest, and gaped at him, horrified, fearspren growing up from the ground around her.
Dalinar glanced toward a sphere lantern, which had a polished metal surface. The man who looked back seemed more Voidbringer than man, face crusted over with blackened blood, hair matted with it, blue eyes wide, jaw clenched. He was sliced with what seemed to be a hundred wounds, his padded uniform in tatters.
“You shouldn’t do this,” Evi said. “Rest. Sleep, Dalinar. Think about this. Give it a few days.”
So tired …
“The entire kingdom thinks us weak, Dalinar,” Sadeas whispered. “We took too long to put this rebellion down. You have never listened to me before, but listen now. You want to prevent this sort of thing from happening again? You must punish them. Every one.”
“Punish them…” Dalinar said, the Thrill rising again. Pain. Anger. Humiliation. He pressed his hands against the map table to steady himself. “The Soulcaster that my brother sent. She can make two things?”
“Grain and oil,” Teleb said.
“Good. Set her to work.”
“More food supplies?”
“No, oil. As much as we have gemstones for. Oh, and someone take my wife to her tent so she may recover from her unwarranted grief. Everyone else, gather round. In the morning, we make Rathalas an example. I promised Tanalan that his widows would weep for what I did here, but that is too merciful for what they’ve done to me.
“I intend to so thoroughly ruin this place that for ten generations, nobody will dare build here for fear of the spirits who will haunt it. We will make a pyre of this city, and there shall be no weeping for its passing, for none will remain to weep.”
ELEVEN YEARS AGO
Dalinar agreed to change clothing. He washed his face and arms, and let a surgeon look at his wounds.
The red mist was still there, coloring his vision. He would not sleep. It wouldn’t let him.
About an hour after he’d arrived in camp, he trudged back to the command tent, cleaned but not particularly refreshed.
The generals had drawn up a new set of battle plans to take the city walls, as instructed by Sadeas. Dalinar inspected and made a few changes, but told them to suspend making plans to march down into the city and clear it. He had something else in mind.
“Brightlord!” a messenger woman said, arriving at the tent. She stepped in. “An envoy is leaving the city. Flying the flag of truce.”
“Shoot them dead,” Dalinar said calmly.