Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive 3)

“I know, but I was busy. We got a caravan from Kholinar today.” She leaned close to him. “There was real flour in one of the packages. I traded in some favors. You know I’ve been wanting you to try some of my father’s Thaylen bread? I thought maybe we’d fix it tonight.”

“Your father hates me.”

“He’s coming around. Besides, he loves anyone who compliments his bread.”

“I have evening practice.”

“You just got done practicing.”

“I just got done warming up.” He looked to her, then grimaced. “I organized the evening practice, Tarah. I can’t just skip it. Besides, I thought you were going to be busy all evening. Maybe tomorrow, lunch?”

He kissed her on the cheek and reclaimed his spear. He’d taken only a step away when she spoke.

“I’m leaving, Kal,” she said from behind.

He stumbled over his own feet, then spun about. “What?”

“I’m transferring,” she said. “They offered me a scribe’s job in Mourn’s Vault, with the highprince’s house. It’s a good opportunity, particularly for someone like me.”

“But…” He gaped. “Leaving?”

“I wanted to tell you over dinner, not out here in the cold. It’s something I have to do. Father’s getting older; he’s worried he’ll end up being shipped to the Shattered Plains. If I can get work, he can join me.”

Kaladin put a hand to his head. She couldn’t just leave, could she?

Tarah walked over, stood on the tips of her toes, and kissed him lightly on the lips.

“Could you … not go?” he asked.

She shook her head.

“Maybe I could get a transfer?” he said. “To the highprince’s standing house guard?”

“Would you do that?”

“I…”

No. He wouldn’t.

Not while he carried that stone in his pocket, not while the memory of his brother dying was fresh in his mind. Not while lighteyed highlords got boys killed in petty fights.

“Oh, Kal,” she whispered, then squeezed his arm. “Maybe someday you’ll learn how to be there for the living, not just for the dead.”

After she left, he got two letters from her, talking about her life in Mourn’s Vault. He had paid someone to read them to him.

He never sent responses. Because he was stupid, because he didn’t understand. Because men make mistakes when they’re young and angry.

Because she had been right.

* * *

Kaladin shouldered his harpoon, leading his companions through the strange forest. They’d flown part of the way, but needed to conserve what little Stormlight they had left.

So, they’d spent the last two days hiking. Trees and more trees, lifespren floating among them, the occasional bobbing souls of fish. Syl kept saying that they were lucky they hadn’t encountered any angerspren or other predators. To her, this forest was strangely silent, strangely empty.

The jungle-style trees had given way to taller, more statuesque ones with deep crimson trunks and limbs like burnt-red crystals that, at the ends, burst into small collections of minerals. The rugged obsidian landscape was full of deep valleys and endless towering hills. Kaladin was beginning to worry that—despite the motionless sun to provide an unerring way to gauge their heading—they were going in the wrong direction.

“Storms, bridgeboy,” Adolin said, hiking up the incline after him. “Maybe a break?”

“At the top,” Kaladin said.

Without Stormlight, Shallan trailed farthest behind, Pattern at her side. Exhaustionspren circled in the air above, like large chickens. Though she tried to push herself, she wasn’t a soldier, and often was the biggest limitation to their pace. Of course, without her mapmaking skills and memory of Thaylen City’s exact location, they probably wouldn’t have any idea which way to go.

Fortunately, there was no sign of pursuit. Still, Kaladin couldn’t help worrying that they were moving too slowly.

Be there, Tarah had told him. For the living.

He urged them up this hillside, past a section of broken ground, where the obsidian had fractured like layers of crem that hadn’t hardened properly. Worry pulled him forward. Step after relentless step.

He had to get to the Oathgate. He would not fail like he had in Kholinar.

A single glowing windspren burst alight next to him as he reached the top of the hill. Cresting it, he found himself overlooking a sea of souls. Thousands upon thousands of candle flames bobbed about in the next valley over, moving above a grand ocean of glass beads.

Thaylen City.

Adolin joined him, then finally Shallan and the three spren. Shallan sighed and settled to the ground, coughing softly from the effort of the climb.

Amid the sea of lights were two towering spren, much like the ones they’d seen in Kholinar. One sparkled a multitude of colors while the other shimmered an oily black. Both stood tall, holding spears as long as a building. The sentries of the Oathgate, and they didn’t look corrupted.

Beneath them, the device itself manifested as a large stone platform with a wide, sweeping white bridge running over the beads and to the shore.

That bridge was guarded by an entire army of enemy spren, hundreds—perhaps thousands—strong.

If I’m correct and my research true, then the question remains. Who is the ninth Unmade? Is it truly Dai-Gonarthis? If so, could their actions have actually caused the complete destruction of Aimia?

—From Hessi’s Mythica, page 307

Dalinar stood alone in the rooms Queen Fen had given him, staring out the window, looking west. Toward Shinovar, far beyond the horizon. A land with strange beasts like horses, chickens. And humans.

He’d left the other monarchs arguing in the temple below; anything he said only seemed to widen the rifts among them. They didn’t trust him. They’d never really trusted him. His deception proved them right.

Storms. He felt furious with himself. He should have released those visions, should have immediately told the others about Elhokar. There had simply been so much piling on top of him. His memories … his excommunication … worry for Adolin and Elhokar …

Part of him couldn’t help but be impressed by how deftly he’d been outmaneuvered. Queen Fen worried about Dalinar being genuine; the enemy had delivered perfect proof that Dalinar had hidden political motives. Noura and the Azish worried that the powers were dangerous, whispering of Lost Radiants. To them, the enemy indicated that Dalinar was being manipulated by evil visions. And to Taravangian—who spoke so often of philosophy—the enemy suggested that their moral foundation for the war was a sham.

Or maybe that dart was for Dalinar himself. Taravangian said that a king was justified in doing terrible things in the name of the state. But Dalinar …

For once, he’d assumed what he was doing was right.

Did you really think you belonged here? the Stormfather asked. That you were native to Roshar?

“Yes, maybe,” Dalinar said. “I thought … maybe we came from Shinovar originally.”

That is the land you were given, the Stormfather said. A place where the plants and animals you brought here could grow.

“We weren’t able to confine ourselves to what we were given.”