Chapter 132

I find stories of the Knight of Wind to be most intriguing. They call him Stormblessed, but best I can tell, the storm alternately tried to kill him and proclaim him its son. I wonder what it knew that we do not.

—From Knights of Wind and Truth, page 34

A dolin grinned, holding the three-pronged aluminum candelabra that he’d used to block Abidi’s Blade. Shaped a little like a fork, the branching prongs reminded him of a Marati swordbreaker. At any rate, the sturdy metal construction caught the Blade mere inches from Adolin’s face.

The fight dynamics changed.

Abidi started to try for real, attacking more relentlessly. But Adolin found, here in this dim throne room in a foreign land, a place for a swordsman. He fought using knife and sword style, another one that Zahel had drilled into him—though it was not used in formal duels.

Abidi moved like the wind, and had the power of Plate. But Adolin …

Adolin cared.

That wasn’t always enough. But today he backed it up with a lifetime of training and an enthusiastic passion for the duel. He focused on dodging and parrying, but he engaged instead of running.

That shouldn’t have been enough against such a powerful foe, yet time became as melting wax, moments flowing thickly into one another. Lessons resurfaced about not letting the enemy maximize the power of their Plate. As they clashed, Adolin diverted the enemy’s attacks rather than catching them—not letting Abidi shove him backward.

He let his enemy overstep, try too hard, stumble and struggle with the strength of his Plate. Abidi could easily overpower him if Adolin tried to pit their muscles against one another—but it meant nothing if Abidi couldn’t land a hit or otherwise leverage the Plate.

Seconds became as one. Adolin moved like water, or the trembling flame. He was as careful and precise as he’d ever been—near to perfect as he incorporated the peg and his unconventional dagger into his style. The only sounds were footsteps. Clangs. Thump of peg on stone or carpet. And an increasingly frustrated grunting from the Fused.

“Why?” Abidi finally demanded. “Why do you even bother ? Azir isn’t your land. This isn’t your fight.”

Why? Adolin gave it a moment before replying.

“You made it our fight,” he said. “When you invaded. You unified us as nothing has ever been able to do. Alethi tyrants tried and failed, but nothing works like a common enemy.” Adolin hesitated. “Besides. I promised I would help.”

“Bah!” Abidi said. “You humans and your oaths.”

“Not an oath,” Adolin whispered, parrying the Shardblade with a clang. “A promise. ”

To him they were different. In ways he was starting to realize were important, deep down to his core identity.

“Oh, look out, Szeth!” his spren called.

Szeth had no opportunity to “look out” because he didn’t know which direction to turn—besides, attacks were coming from all angles. His broken arm had barely healed. He tried to Lash himself into the air, but the Stoneward snapped out a whip, wrapping Szeth’s leg, then made the whip hard and unyielding as steel.

Szeth was yanked back down, and tried to protect himself with his hands and arms as attacks came from all sides again. The pain was nearly unbearable, new sparks of it flaring up from each punch or kick. They forced him to the ground, and the stone became liquid beneath his feet.

“That’s not good!” Szeth’s spren cried from somewhere. “Um, maybe get up, Szeth?”

He groaned. A part of him wanted to use his Stormlight to send these fools into oblivion. To bring death and destruction. But … was that the right choice?

Why, after all of this, did he still not know the right choice? Why couldn’t someone tell him?

Through blurry, tearstained eyes, he saw a figure grab him by his loose white uniform. Szeth blinked, making out his father’s shape. The mouth a snarl, lips parted to show teeth.

But the eyes … the eyes were crying.

Neturo threw him tumbling across the ground. Szeth came to a rest, a mass of pains upon pains. He drew in the last of his Stormlight, waiting for its healing touch.

“I yield,” Szeth said, lying there. “Please, I yield.”

“No.” Ishu’s voice, from farther away. “You are not permitted to yield. This is over only when I say it is, Szeth.”

Szeth raised his head from the cold stone, looking past six approaching figures. Toward the more distant forms of Kaladin, Nin, and Ishu. He blinked.

“How long?” Szeth forced out.

“Until you fight and lose, ” Ishu called. “I will not stand for this weakness, Szeth.”

He sighed and slumped back. Though a part of his mind … a part of his mind noticed something.

Six Honorbearers. I was confused at first, not expecting my father among them. Because I fought six before.

But including him, there should be seven.

He’d counted ten by adding Ishu, Nin, Sivi, and the empty space Szeth was to take. But with both Neturo and Ishu, that double-counted Bondsmiths.

There were only nine accounted for then. The Edgedancer was missing. He forced himself to stand and confront them: familiar faces, including his father and sister. As they struck again, he saw the solution.

He’d fought the Edgedancer in Shadesmar alongside Pozen. She hadn’t been reborn like the others. Why not? Was it because …

Storms.

She was the sole one he’d killed with Nightblood.

Rlain knelt with Renarin by the gemstone prison. As they did, Renarin reached out and took Rlain’s hand for support. Rlain looked down, attuning Joy, then found that feeling remarkable. How normal it felt, how easily he’d responded to that touch, how much he enjoyed it.

“We found the prison,” Renarin said. “So … we have to decide. What do you think we should do?”

“We take it with us, I suppose,” Rlain said. “We hide it deeper in the Spiritual Realm.”

“To wander forever?” Renarin said. “Storms … is that what we’re here to do? Find a way to patch the gemstone so she can’t send hints to anyone else, then die in here like Melishi did?”

Both fell silent. Rlain attuned Resolve.

“We could find a way out afterward,” Rlain said. “Or we could take it and hide it in Urithiru.”

“Since that has proven so secure,” Renarin replied. “The enemy has broken in twice in the last year alone!”

“The Sibling is awake now to stop them.” He said it to Skepticism, however. The tower might protect from Fused, but what of other humans? Someone would want this prison. It was far too valuable.

Because Odium fears her … Rlain thought.

And … what if they did something else with it? This was the god his people had rejected so long ago. Would it be a betrayal to free her now? Or would it instead be poetic?

Would she just start another war, enraged? Would she kill him, kill Renarin? Destroy? Dared he even consider unleashing such a terrible force upon the world?

Be careful, Rlain, Tumi said. Please, be very careful.

Inside the gemstone, Ba-Ado-Mishram had retreated, the tempest stilling. As if she was resigned to her fate.

“You led us to you,” Renarin said. “Why?”

To destroy you!

“Locked in a prison?” Renarin said. “With only the faintest crack from which to speak?” He surveyed the large heliodor, cracked at one corner, perhaps when dropped here by Melishi.

Rlain wondered what it had been like for the human, near the end. Wandering, likely weak. He looked like he’d died of old age, or he’d run out of water over a long period of time. A sad way to die, but then again, this was the man who had orchestrated the betrayal and enslavement of Rlain’s entire species. So he found he didn’t mind so much that the death had likely been miserable.

Destroy you, Mishram said, softer. Get … vengeance … She had slowed further in her gemstone, now looking so very small. She was afraid, alone, and trapped.

“You led us,” Rlain said to the Rhythm of Hope, “because you thought we might help you, didn’t you?”

Silence. Not even a pulsed rhythm.

Two thousand years in a prison. Betrayed, hating all humankind, she still hoped for freedom—and she knew if no one ever found her, she’d never get out.

“Defend yourself!” Ishar shouted, his face growing red as Szeth just continued to take the beating. “You are to be a Herald! Show some pride !”

Kaladin frowned, noticing that the Honorbearers seemed to react to Ishar’s emotions. Moving more quickly, more aggressively, as he shouted.

“Ishar,” Kaladin said.

“Hmm?” Ishar asked. “Was there something else, child?”

Kaladin felt chilled by how easily Ishar changed from enraged to placid. On the field, the Honorbearers’ attacks calmed.

“We want to help you,” Syl said, having reappeared—full sized, beside Kaladin—no longer the flute.

“That is kind of you,” Ishar said. “But I need no help, not from you two. Watch, and do not interfere.”

“Ishar,” Nale said from the other side. “I think … I think you should listen. We do need help. We’re … we’re not right.”

“I’ve observed that in you and the others,” Ishar said. “But I have become the Almighty, and have withstood the darkness.” He narrowed his eyes. “I hold our bond together, fractured though it is. But, Nale, I do sense your darkness. I feel it in all of you, even Taln. I carry your burden, in part, but I resist it. I am a god. ”

“You took the power of Odium, Ishar,” Nale said. “And it’s corrupting you.”

“I subsume that power and make it mine. I corrupt it. ”

Syl looked to Kaladin, seeming helpless. He shared the emotion. Even the Wind had stilled, as if she didn’t know what to do either.

“Stormblessed,” Ishar said, “do you remember what I told you when we first met in this land?”

“That I could have an audience with you,” Kaladin said, “if I helped Szeth.”

“Not that,” Ishar said. “I told you how I bolstered the Heralds, and held their darkness. Do you wish to feel it? I could show you a grief that would break any mortal. It would break the Heralds, if I allowed it.” He laid his hands over his heart. “This is why I am a god. You have your audience. Is this all you wished to do with it? Tell me Midius’s silly tales?”

The spren wait, Syl said in his mind. Thousands of them. Worried, because something dangerous is coming. They are here with us. Kaladin, we have to do something. What?

Kaladin sweated, and felt impotent. He couldn’t help Ishar on such a deadline; that wasn’t how healing worked. Not of the body, and certainly not of the mind.

So maybe it was best to try another tactic. “You are a god,” Kaladin said, “yet leave your people without choices?”

Ishar growled softly. “You dare question me?”

“Yes,” Kaladin said. “How can you be a god if nobody worships you?”

“This entire land worships me!” Ishar said, and Kaladin winced as the attacks against Szeth became more violent. “Shinovar, and beyond. They pray to the Almighty.”

“Who they think is Tanavast.” Kaladin waved to the Honorbearers. “They are directly under your control, aren’t they? Like the people of this land we passed, hiding in shadows, barely self-aware? You force them to follow you. You haven’t become their god, Ishar. They don’t worship you, for they cannot. You’re just another pretender.”

“How dare you,” Ishar said, his eyes starting to glow.

“Now,” Kaladin said, chin up, “if you were to release them, and they still worshipped you … that would be different.”

“Child,” Ishar said softly, “I am over seven thousand years old. You think you can trick me into doing as you wish? A god is no god if the worship, or even the mild regard, of his inferiors is requisite to his status.” He turned to Kaladin, his back to the swords. “Why are you here?”

“I—”

“What do you think you add?” Ishar asked. “I told you before, I did not foresee you. It makes no sense that you would come here. You, who are too broken to fight? You, who cannot help with strategy or planning? Dalinar sent you because he needed you out of the way. Your part is done, and you scramble for relevance. You are not helping. You cannot help. Sit down and stop trying to distract me.”

Each word should have been a spear. Perhaps even a few weeks ago they would have been. A condemnation, when Kaladin had tried so hard to protect and help others. Working until it left him battered beyond functionality, like a worn-out shield.

Yet something had changed in him. Or had been changing. His worth did not come from whether he helped. Only in whether he tried.

Ishar strode toward the fighting, and Kaladin realized he’d made an error. Playing into the man’s delusions, even to try to manipulate him, felt wrong. Underhanded.

So instead he spoke words he knew Ishar would ignore, but words that needed to be said. “You aren’t a god, Ishar,” Kaladin said. “You’re a man. Seven thousand years old, yes. But still a man. And you need help. ”

Ishar stopped and glared at him, blue robes rippling as the Wind … the Wind started to return.

“The spren are afraid,” Syl said, stepping up beside Kaladin. “Terrified, Ishar. They know, as I think you know, that something difficult is coming. Let’s face it together. You know you’ve driven them away. Shouldn’t that be a sign that what you’re doing is wrong?”

“I have plans for the spren,” Ishar said, a softness to his voice that made Kaladin’s hair stand on end. “They might fear what is coming. Their fear of me should be greater.” He spun and strode toward the fighting, then with a furious tone bellowed, “Of all the things I expected of you, Szeth, disobedience is not one of them! Fight!”

And all attention turned back toward the ragged man wearing white. His Stormlight starting to fail.