Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive 3)

Syl remained imprisoned.

“Look here.” Shallan tipped her sketched map toward Kaladin. “Pattern says there’s an honorspren stronghold near Kharbranth in our world. They call it Unyielding Fidelity. We’ve got to be heading there. We went southwest after leaving Celebrant.”

“While we were in the hold,” Kaladin said softly, “I saw a sea of tiny flames through the porthole. A town on our side?”

“That was here,” Shallan said, pointing at her map. “See where the rivers meet, just southwest of the lake? There are towns there, on our side. The river peninsulas should have blocked our way, but the spren seem to have cut a canal through the stone. We wove east around the Icingway River, then swung west again.”

“So you’re saying…”

She pointed at a spot with her charcoal pencil. “We’re right about here, heading toward Kharbranth across the Frostlands.”

Kaladin rubbed his chin. He glanced toward an honorspren passing above, and narrowed his eyes. He’d spent their first day of freedom arguing with the honorspren—which had ended with him locked up for another two days.

“Kaladin…” Shallan said.

“They need to let her out,” he said. “Prisons are terrible for me—they’ll be worse for her.”

“Then help me figure out a way off this ship.”

He looked back at her map and pointed. “Thaylen City,” he said. “If we continue this direction, we’ll eventually pass just north of it.”

“ ‘Just north’ in this case meaning more than three hundred miles away from it, in the middle of a bead ocean.”

“Far closer than we’ve been to any other Oathgate,” he said. “And if we can get the ship to swing south a little, we could maybe get to the coast of Longbrow’s Straits, which will be stone on this side. Or do you think we should still be trying for Azure’s phantom ‘perpendicularity’ in the Horneater Peaks?”

“I…” He spoke with such authority, such a compelling sense of motion. “I don’t know, Kaladin.”

“We’re heading in the right direction,” he said, firm. “I saw it, Shallan. We just need to continue with the ship a few more days, then find a way to escape. We can hike to the Oathgate on this side, and you can transfer us to Thaylen City.”

It sounded reasonable. Well, except for the fact that the honorspren were watching them. And the fact that the Fused knew where they were now, and were probably gathering forces to give chase. And the fact that they had to somehow escape from a ship in the middle of a sea of beads, reach the shore, then hike two hundred miles to reach Thaylen City.

All of that could fade before Kaladin’s passion. All but the worry that topped them all—could she even make the Oathgate work? She couldn’t help feeling that too much of this plan depended on her.

Yet those eyes …

“We could try a mutiny,” Veil said. “Maybe those mistspren who do all the work will listen. They can’t be happy, always hopping about, following honorspren orders.”

“I don’t know,” Kaladin said, voice hushing as one of these spren—made entirely of mist, save for the hands and face—walked past. “Could be reckless. I can’t fight them all.”

“What if you had Stormlight?” Veil asked. “If I could pinch it back for you? What then?”

He rubbed at his chin again. Storms, he looked good with a beard. All ragged and untamed through the face, contrasted by his sharp blue uniform. Like a wild spren of passion, trapped by the oaths and codes …

Wait.

Wait, had that been Veil?

Shallan shook free of the momentary drifting of personality. Kaladin didn’t seem to notice.

“Maybe,” he said. “You really think you can steal the gemstones back for us? I’d feel a lot more comfortable with some Stormlight in my pocket.”

“I…” Shallan swallowed. “Kaladin, I don’t know if … Maybe it would be best not to fight them. They’re honorspren.”

“They’re jailers,” he said, but then calmed. “But they are taking us the right direction, if only inadvertently. What if we stole back our Stormlight, then simply jumped off the ship? Can you find a bead to make us a passage toward land, like you did at Kholinar?”

“I … guess I could try. But wouldn’t the honorspren simply swing around and pick us up again?”

“I’ll think about that,” Kaladin said. “Try and find some beads that we can use.” He walked across the deck, passing by Pattern—who stood with hands clasped behind his back, thinking number-filled thoughts. Kaladin eventually settled beside Azure, speaking softly with her, probably outlining their plan.

Such that it was.

Shallan tucked her sketchpad under her arm and looked over the side of the ship. So many beads, so many souls, piled on top of each other. Kaladin wanted her to search through all of that for something helpful?

She glanced toward a passing sailor, a mistspren who had gaseous limbs that ended in gloved hands. Her feminine face was the shape of a porcelain mask, and she—like the others of her kind—wore a vest and trousers that seemed to float on a body made of swirling, indistinct fog.

“Is there a way for me to get some of those beads?” Shallan asked.

The mistspren stopped in place.

“Please?” Shallan asked. “I—”

The sailor jogged off, and then returned a short time later with the captain: a tall, imperious-looking honorspren named Notum. He glowed a soft blue-white, and wore an outdated—but sharp—naval uniform, which was part of his substance. His beard was of a cut she hadn’t seen before, with the chin shaved, almost like a Horneater, but with a thin mustache and a sculpted line of hair that ran from it up his cheeks and blended into his sideburns.

“You have a request?” he asked her.

“I would like some beads, Captain,” Shallan said. “To practice my art, if you please. I need to do something to pass the time on this trip.”

“Manifesting random souls is dangerous, Lightweaver. I would not have you doing it wantonly upon my decks.”

Keeping the true nature of her order from him had proven impossible, considering how Pattern followed her around.

“I promise not to manifest anything,” she said. “I merely want to practice visualizing the souls inside the beads. It’s part of my training.”

He studied her, clasping his hands behind his back. “Very well,” he said—which surprised her. She hadn’t expected that to work. He gave an order, however, and a mistspren lowered a bucket on a rope to get her some beads.

“Thank you,” Shallan said.

“It was a simple request,” the captain said. “Just be careful. I suppose you’d need Stormlight to manifest anyway, but still … be careful.”

“What happens if we carry the beads away too far?” Shallan asked, curious as the mistspren handed her the bucket. “They are tied to objects in the Physical Realm, right?”

“You can carry them anywhere in Shadesmar you wish,” the captain said. “Their tie is through the Spiritual Realm, and distance doesn’t matter. However, drop them—let them free—and they’ll work their way back to the general location of their physical counterpart.” He eyed her. “You are very new to all of this. When did it begin again? Radiants, swearing Ideals?”