Rhythm of War (The Stormlight Archive 4)

Their best warriors, however, would have stayed at the city in the small, strong structures built there. More than one family had claimed a city right after a storm. It was one of the best times to attack, assuming you could muster your numbers quickly enough.

“This is going to be fun,” Melu said to Excitement.

“I don’t know if that’s the correct way to think of it,” Eshonai said, though she felt the same eagerness. A desire to charge in. “Though … if we can arrive before the boasts are done…”

The others began attuning Amusement or Excitement, grinning. Eshonai led the way, ignoring the calls of those leaving the stormshelter. There was a more urgent matter to attend to.

As they approached the city, she could see the rival family mustered outside the gateway, lifting spears and making challenges and taunts. They wore white, of course. It was how one knew an attack was happening, rather than a request for trade or other interaction.

As long as the boasts were continuing, the actual battle hadn’t yet begun. She’d participated in several fights for cities during her family’s years trying to claim one, and they’d always been nasty affairs—the worst one leaving over a dozen people dead on each side.

Well, today they’d see about …

She stopped, holding up her hand to make the others pause. They did so—though a part of Eshonai wondered why she had decided to take charge. It simply felt natural.

They’d been approaching a fissure in the wall surrounding the city. That wall might once have been grand, but mere hints of its former majesty remained. Most of it had worn low, split by large gaps.

Here, a figure moved in the shadows. It looked ominous, dangerous—but then Venli emerged into the light, waving them forward. How had she gotten to the city so quickly?

Eshonai approached, and Venli looked her up and down with a slow, deliberate gaze. The drums beat in the background, urging Eshonai forward. Yet that look in her sister’s eyes …

“So it worked,” Venli said. “Praise the ancient storms for that. You look good, sister. All bulked up and ready to serve.”

“This isn’t who I am,” Eshonai said, gesturing to the form. “But there is a certain … thrill to holding it.”

“Go visit Sharefel,” Venli said. “He’s waiting for you.”

“The drums…” Eshonai said.

“The enemy will continue howling insults for a little while yet,” Venli said. “Visit Sharefel.”

Sharefel. The family’s Shardbearer. Upon obtaining this city, by tradition the defeated family had given up the city’s Shards for her family to protect and keep.

“Venli,” Eshonai said. “We do not use Shards upon other listeners. Those are for hunts alone.”

“Oh, sister,” Venli said to Amusement, walking around her, then inspecting Thude and the others. “If we’re going to ever stand a hope of resisting the humans—when they inevitably turn against us—we must be ready to bear the weapons with which we were blessed.”

Eshonai wanted to attune Reprimand at the suggestion, but she remembered the things Dalinar Kholin had said to her. If the listeners weren’t unified, they would be easy pickings.

“I want to get to the fight,” Melu said to Excitement, an anticipationspren—like a long streamer connected to a round sphere below—bouncing around behind her.

“I think it’s worth trying not to kill anyone,” Thude said to Consideration. “With this form … I feel it would be unfair.”

“Bear the Shards,” Venli urged. “Show them the dangers of approaching us to demand battle.”

Eshonai pushed past her sister, and the others followed. Venli trailed along behind as well. Eshonai didn’t intend to use the Shards against her people, but perhaps there was a purpose to visiting Sharefel. She wound through the city, passing crem-filled puddles and vines stretching out from rockbuds to lap up the moisture.

The Shardbearer’s hut was by the front wall, near the drums. It was one of the strongest structures in the city, one they always kept well-maintained. Today the door was open, welcoming. Eshonai stepped into the doorway.

“Ah…” a soft voice said to the Rhythm of the Lost. “So it is true. We have warriors once more.”

Eshonai stepped forward, finding the elderly listener sitting in his seat, light from the doorway illuminating his pattern of mostly black skin. Feeling it appropriate, even if she didn’t quite know why, she knelt before him.

“I have long sung the old songs,” Sharefel said, “dreaming of this day. I always thought I would be the one to find it. How? What spren?”

“Painspren,” Eshonai said.

“They flee during storms.”

“We captured them,” Eshonai said as a couple of others entered the chamber, striking dangerous silhouettes. “Using a human method.”

“Ahh…” he said. “I shall try it myself then, at the next storm. But this is a new era, and deserves a new Shardbearer. Which of you will take my Shards? Which of you can bear this burden, and this glory?”

The group became still. Not all families had Shardbearers; there were only eight sets among all the listeners. Those who held the proper eight cities were blessed with them, to be wielded only in hunts against greatshells. Those were rare events, where many families would band together to harvest a gemheart for growing crops, then feast upon the slain beast.

That … did not seem the future of their Shards anymore. If the humans discover we have these, Eshonai thought, it will be war.

“Give the Shards to me,” Melu said to Excitement. She stepped forward, though Thude put his hand upon her breastplate as if to restrain her. She hummed to Betrayal, and he hummed to Irritation. A challenge from both.

This could get ugly very quickly.

“No!” Eshonai said. “No, none of us will take them. None of us are ready.” She looked to the elderly Shardbearer. “You keep them. With Plate, you are as firm as any warrior, Sharefel. I merely ask that you stand with us today.”

The drums stopped sounding.

“I will not lift the Blade against other listeners,” Sharefel said to Skepticism.

“You will not need to,” Eshonai said. “Our goal today will not be to win a battle, but to promise a new beginning.”

* * *

A short time later, they stepped out of the city. Once, gates had likely stood in this opening, but the listeners could not create wooden marvels on that scale. Not yet.

The battle had already started, though it hadn’t moved to close combat yet. Her family’s warriors would step forward and throw their spears, and the other family would dodge. Then the attacking family would return spears. If someone was hit, one side might withdraw and give up the battle. If not, eventually one side might rush the other.

Spren of all varieties had been drawn to the event, and spun or hovered around the perimeters. Eshonai’s family’s archers hung back, their numbers a show of strength, though they wouldn’t use their weapons here. Bows were too deadly—and too accurate—to be used in harming others.

There … had been times, unfortunately, when in the heat of fighting, traditions had been broken. Normal battles had become horrific massacres. Eshonai had never been part of one of those, but she’d seen the aftereffects during her childhood, when passing a failed assault on another city.