Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive 3)

“It could have been so glorious,” Amaram said, swatting aside the attack. “You, me, Dalinar. Together on the same side.”

“The wrong side.”

“Is it wrong to want to help the ones who truly own this land? Is it not honorable?”

“It’s not Amaram I speak to anymore, is it? Who, or what, are you?”

“Oh, it’s me,” Amaram said. He dismissed one of his Blades, grabbed his helm. With a tug of the hand, it finally shattered, exploding away and revealing the face of Meridas Amaram—surrounded by amethyst crystals, glowing with a soft and somehow dark light.

He grinned. “Odium promised me something grand, and that promise has been kept. With honor.”

“You still pretend to speak of honor?”

“Everything I do is for honor.” Amaram swept with a single Blade, making Kaladin dodge. “It was honor that drove me to seek the return of the Heralds, of powers, and of our god.”

“So you could join the other side?”

Lightning flashed behind Amaram, casting red light and long shadows as he resummoned his second Blade. “Odium showed me what the Heralds have become. We spent years trying to get them to return. But they were here all along. They abandoned us, spearman.”

Amaram carefully circled Kaladin with his two Shardblades.

He’s waiting for the Fused to come help, Kaladin thought. That’s why he’s being cautious now.

“I hurt, once,” Amaram said. “Did you know that? After I was forced to kill your squad, I … hurt. Until I realized. It wasn’t my fault.” The color of his glowing eyes intensified to a simmering crimson. “None of this is my fault.”

Kaladin attacked—unfortunately, he barely knew what he was facing. The ground rippled and became liquid, almost catching him again. Fire trailed behind Amaram’s arms as he swung with both Shardblades. Somehow, he briefly ignited the very air.

Kaladin blocked one Blade, then the other, but couldn’t get in an attack. Amaram was fast and brutal, and Kaladin didn’t dare touch the ground, lest his feet freeze to the liquefied stone. After a few more exchanges, Kaladin was forced to retreat.

“You’re outclassed, spearman,” Amaram said. “Give in, and convince the city to surrender. That is for the best. No more need die today. Let me be merciful.”

“Like you were merciful to my friends? Like you were merciful to me, when you gave me these brands?”

“I left you alive. I spared you.”

“An attempt to assuage your conscience.” Kaladin clashed with the highprince. “A failed attempt.”

“I made you, Kaladin!” Amaram’s red eyes lit the crystals that rimmed his face. “I gave you that granite will, that warrior’s poise. This, the person you’ve become, was my gift!”

“A gift at the expense of everyone I loved?”

“What do you care? It made you strong! Your men died in the name of battle, so that the strongest man would have the weapon. Anyone would have done what I did, even Dalinar himself.”

“Didn’t you tell me you’d given up that grief?”

“Yes! I’m beyond guilt!”

“Then why do you still hurt?”

Amaram flinched.

“Murderer,” Kaladin said. “You’ve switched sides to find peace, Amaram. But you won’t ever have it. He’ll never give it to you.”

Amaram roared, sweeping in with his Shardblades. Kaladin Lashed himself upward, then—as Amaram passed underneath—twisted and came back down, swinging in a powerful, two-handed grip. In response to an unspoken command, Syl became a hammer, which crashed against the back of Amaram’s Plate.

The cuirass-style breastplate—which was all one piece—exploded with an unexpected force, pushing Kaladin backward across the stone. Overhead, the lightning rumbled. They were fully in the Everstorm’s shadow, which made it even more ghastly as he saw what had happened to Amaram.

The highprince’s entire chest had collapsed inward. There was no sign of ribs or internal organs. Instead, a large violet crystal pulsed inside his chest cavity, overgrown with dark veins. If he’d been wearing a uniform or padding beneath the armor, it had been consumed.

He turned toward Kaladin, heart and lungs replaced by a gemstone that glowed with Odium’s dark light.

“Everything I’ve done,” Amaram said, blinking red eyes, “I’ve done for Alethkar. I’m a patriot!”

“If that is true,” Kaladin whispered, “why do you still hurt?”

Amaram screamed, charging him.

Kaladin raised Syl, who became a Shardblade. “Today, what I do, I do for the men you killed. I am the man I’ve become because of them.”

“I made you! I forged you!” He leaped at Kaladin, propelling himself off the ground, hanging in the air.

And in so doing, he entered Kaladin’s domain.

Kaladin launched at Amaram. The highprince swung, but the winds themselves curled around Kaladin, and he anticipated the attack. He Lashed himself to the side, narrowly avoiding one Blade. Windspren streaked past him as he dodged the other by a hair’s width.

Syl became a spear in his grip, matching his motions perfectly. He spun and slammed her against the gemstone at Amaram’s heart. The amethyst cracked, and Amaram faltered in the air—then dropped.

Two Shardblades vanished to mist as the highprince fell some twenty feet to crash into the ground.

Kaladin floated downward toward him. “Ten spears go to battle,” he whispered, “and nine shatter. Did that war forge the one that remained? No, Amaram. All the war did was identify the spear that would not break.”

Amaram climbed to his knees, howling with a bestial sound and clutching the flickering gemstone at his chest, which went out, plunging the area into darkness.

Kaladin! Syl shouted in Kaladin’s mind.

He barely dodged as two Fused swooped past, their lances narrowly missing his chest. Two more came in from the left, one from the right. A sixth carried the hulking Fused back, rescued from Kaladin’s Lashing.

They’d gone to fetch friends. It seemed the Fused had realized that their best path to stopping Dalinar was to first remove Kaladin from the battlefield.

* * *

Renarin puffed in and out as the thunderclast collapsed—crushing houses in its fall, but also breaking off its arm. It reached upward with its remaining arm, bleating a plaintive cry. Renarin and his companion—the Thaylen Shardbearer—had cut off both legs at the knees.

The Thaylen tromped up and slapped him—carefully—on the back with a Plated hand. “Very good fighting.”

“I just distracted it while you cut chunks of its legs off.”

“You did good,” the Thaylen said. He nodded toward the thunderclast, which got to its knees, then slipped. “How to end?”

It will fear you! Glys said from within Renarin. It will go. Make it so that it will go.

“I’ll see what I can do,” Renarin said to the Thaylen, then carefully picked his way over to the street and up a level to get a better view of the thunderclast’s head.

“So … Glys?” he asked. “What do I do?”

Light. You will make it go with light.

The thing pulled itself up across the rubble of a destroyed building. Stone rubbed stone as its enormous, wedge-shaped head turned to Renarin. Recessed molten eyes fluttered, like a sputtering fire.