Chapter 133

Much of what I know of the Knight of Wind, I get from Jasnah Kholin. Now head of our order, and a woman who has shown much patience for a simple Shin bookworm who thinks herself worthy of the task of writing this account.

—From Knights of Wind and Truth, page 22

A dolin kept fighting, and storms …

He was growing tired. He’d pushed himself far too hard today, and even with Regrowth and drugs, he was flagging. His leg stump ached, and he felt blisters there breaking and—with the sweat of his exertion—making the fit slide.

He needed a plan to win, not merely survive.

Abidi fights like many soldiers new to their Shards, he thought. He’ll assume that in Plate he’s invulnerable.

Because of that, he’d let himself get hit. Unfortunately, Adolin couldn’t break a section of Plate with a common sword. It would take tens of precisely targeted blows. But Abidi had a lot of training in fighting against Plate himself—he would expect Adolin to try to shatter a section.

So, for now, that was the strategy Adolin used. He mustered his remaining strength and pushed into an offensive. Abidi laughed, as it would presumably both expose and tire Adolin. But in this, the Fused was wrong.

This was Adolin’s world.

This was who Adolin was.

He moved as the flickering flame that had found tinder, and became a bonfire. The thick moment itself burst aflame, and Adolin found clarity in its light.

This was his world.

This was who he was.

With a sword in his hands, everything briefly made sense again. He had been waiting so, so long for that feeling.

Crack.

His sword hit a section of Plate on Abidi’s left side. The Fused paused, shock manifesting in his posture. The mortal had landed a hit on him? Yes, the blow was meaningless, but the mortal had hit him.

Rage seemed to fill Abidi’s movements as he swept through another sequence of attacks. Adolin dodged, parried, and at just the right time …

Crack!

A second hit on the exact same section of Plate.

“ How? ” Abidi demanded. “You are Radiant. You must be!”

“Do you see Stormlight rising from me?”

“Then how ?”

How?

Why?

He had promised to help Azir. But why?

Because his mother had trained him to care. As Dalinar had worked to make Adolin into a weapon, Evi had worked to make Adolin into one that had meaning. There, within the burning clarity of the perfect duel, Adolin went a level deeper. He understood himself in a way otherwise impossible.

Why?

Why had he always cared so much that his father be perfect? Why be so worried, then so furious, when Dalinar proved flawed?

Because Evi had believed in Dalinar. Against all evidence, she’d loved him. And Adolin, her little boy, desperately wanted her to be right.

That was why. That was the final truth of it. With a sigh, Adolin let go. Let her rest, and let his anger flow away like expelled heat from a flame.

There were many things Adolin could never become. But this one was possible: He could be the man Evi envisioned. A man who cared. A man who fought for a purpose.

Crack!

A third hit on that very same section of Plate. That would do it.

Abidi roared. This was when he would strike, throwing away caution. Adolin set one foot, slid a little on his peg, and stepped into the Fused’s furious blow.

Scrape.

Abidi’s Blade hit right next to Adolin’s shoulder—where he had raised his aluminum candelabra, expertly placing it where he knew the strike would come.

Adolin, however, did not strike at that section of Plate again—no, instead he rammed his sword straight into the eye slit in the helm. Aligned perfectly with the slant of the hole, because Adolin knew that helm like he knew his own name.

One glowing eye went out, pierced clear through.

In any ordinary duel—and many extraordinary ones—that would have been the end. Unfortunately, against a Fused, it was not. Abidi brushed aside Adolin’s sword—breaking off about six inches of it, then ripping the remnants of the weapon out of Adolin’s hand.

That had been his best chance. He’d hoped that with his gemheart cracked, Abidi wouldn’t heal. The gamble failed, for Abidi did not fall. He reached for Adolin, who was too close to dodge. A gauntleted hand seized him under one arm and lifted him into the air.

It was at that moment that Adolin knew for certain nothing he could do would be enough. No matter how good he was with the sword, it wouldn’t be enough. Abidi dropped his Blade—which fell and stuck point-first into the floor—and pulled the remains of Adolin’s sword tip out of his helmet, all while Adolin dangled in his grip, helpless.

The eye healed and began glowing again.

Sometimes your best wasn’t enough. It was a lesson every general had to learn. Adolin had never expected to learn it in a duel.

“What was the point of that?” Abidi demanded. “I can’t be killed so easily. You know what? Now I will slaughter you, little human prince. I don’t care about your emperor any longer. I just want you to bleed. ”

Not enough. Adolin wasn’t enough.

Maya was right, he thought, smiling. I am like my father. I rushed in here alone. Tried to do this by myself.

“I will parade your corpse around once the blood is drained from it,” Abidi said, holding him up, eyes to burning helmeted eyes. “That will terrify the emperor into surrendering, won’t it? Best swordsman alive. Bah! ”

Swordsman. What was Adolin if he couldn’t win with the sword? He asked that question again, and …

For once, did not feel condemned by the truth. He didn’t have to be the best anymore. He was like his father, and that … that was all right, in some cases.

What had Maya said to him? That someday he’d realize why he was really here? It came to him, right there. In a memory of a day when he’d told his father no. When Adolin had refused the throne, refused to be a king. Because he’d been too frightened to live up to a reputation he didn’t think he deserved.

Adolin chuckled.

Abidi eyed him from within the glowing helm. “Panicked? At your end?”

“Just realizing something important at precisely the wrong moment,” Adolin said. Then he whispered, “Yes.”

“Yes?”

“I’ll lead them. They don’t need a swordsman. They’ve got plenty. They need a leader.”

As Abidi studied him, seeming perplexed, Adolin thought. About his father’s failings and his mother’s faith. About a world that wasn’t fair—and didn’t appear to have a place for him.

About everything having a purpose.

Then Adolin whispered, “I’ll do it. But I could use a little help right here. Please.”

“Begging?” Abidi asked. “Delicious!”

“Please,” Adolin said, eyes squeezed closed. He wasn’t speaking to Abidi or even to Maya. It was, he supposed, a prayer. “Help me.”

A chorus of voices replied in his mind: … Sir?

What … what was that?

Sir!

Abidi took Adolin in two hands and spun, hurling him toward the stone wall only eight feet away—using all the force of a man in Plate. A throw like that could crush steel, let alone flesh.

Sir! the voices cried.

In that instant—as Adolin was flung toward his death—a burst of light, like sparks thrown by a hammer on steel, exploded from Abidi and became a swarm of embers. Which flashed to surround Adolin.

Adolin crashed back-first into the wall, and the stone broke.

But Adolin did not.

Sir! the voices said. He became aware of strength. Metal surrounding him, bolstering him. Protecting him.

His Plate.

He saw Abidi gape, stripped of his armor, his bloodied face revealed, his clothing crumpled, his eyes wide and incredulous.

And Adolin remembered the last time he’d been with his Plate, when he’d …

Well, he’d asked it to go with his armor standbys, and serve them. It had been doing so, not distinguishing among the people it had been passed between.

Suddenly, the helmet on Adolin’s head went almost completely transparent from the inside, giving him a full range of view. The voices … they were the spren of his Plate. He could feel them inspecting his peg leg and … troubleshooting?

His leg armor re-formed, becoming tight around the peg and making a kind of metal foot beneath. Springy, it was crafted of several curved pieces wrapping around one another and forming something like three toes.

He felt satisfaction from the spren. This was … a design they knew? From long ago?

Adolin stepped forward, pulling away from the cracked wall. Chips fell around him as his new foot—not as sensitive as a flesh one, yet remarkably supple and strong enough to lift him in Plate—gave him sure footing.

Then, in the dark throne room, a flickering orange-red light like a fire’s flame started to glow from the joints of his armor and from the front of his helm.

There were no symbols on the breastplate, because he was not Radiant. Adolin had no idea what he was, other than the son of both Dalinar and Evi Kholin. The product of both of their hopes. He was Adolin Kholin. A man with very good friends.

Sir! the Plate said, sounding satisfied as Adolin made fists and charged forward.

“Oh, songs, ” Abidi swore.

Neturo kept picking Szeth up, pulling him by his clothing, bringing them nose to nose. Growling. Angry. Crying.

In a moment, Neturo held him even closer, and Szeth—dazed, bloodied—heard something. Words forced out between clenched teeth.

“Please. Help. Us. Son.”

Szeth’s eyes focused. He saw a face that was a mask of anger, but …

But not Neturo’s anger.

“Please, Szeth.” His father’s voice, so small, as if coming from deep inside. “Please. It hurts.”

Neturo hurled him again. Away from the others. As if trying to keep him from harm, but then he stalked forward to attack. Puppets. Ishu had made them puppets. Perhaps it was the sole way to bestow the powers he wanted to.

Everyone in this land, Szeth thought, lying again on the stone. Everyone here is kind of a puppet, trapped in that darkness. Ishu thought he was preparing them for war, but he only hobbled them. Everyone.

The Herald’s madness had spread to the entire land as he Connected to it. Driving away the spren. Leaving Shinovar hollow.

“Szeth!” his spren said, hovering nearby as a slit in the air. “What is wrong?”

“This isn’t my father,” Szeth said. “Not completely.”

The six surrounded him and began kicking again. Bones cracked inside him, and his Stormlight—dwindling—struggled to help. He was … somehow beyond pain. That worried him. It meant his injuries were bad.

“Disobedient!” Ishu’s voice somewhere. “Szeth, all you have to do is obey !”

A boot broke Szeth’s nose, and it didn’t heal. Another took him square in the ribs.

Obey.

“If you’d just do as I say !” Ishu shouted. “Bah! Must I do without Heralds? It will be only me! I will stand against the darkness alone! You are all worthless!”

Szeth remembered a voice. Heard it, almost. His own. As a child. “What is right, Father? Can’t you just tell me?”

Then, his voice again, older, to the Farmer.

“How do you know what to do?”

Older again. To the captain of the guard.

“Just tell me what to do, sir.”

To Sivi, when joining her monastery.

“I’m sure you know what is right.”

Taravangian, Dalinar, Nin. Each time it was less and less a question. More and more a mantra.

I am Truthless. I do not ask.

I do as my masters require.

Never. Again.

Szeth raised his head, finding his knees as they continued to pummel him. Kicking and hitting. He turned his eyes to the sky, and something ignited inside him.

Never. AGAIN.

“I am my own agent,” Szeth shouted. “I make my own choices. I. Am. THE LAW! ”

Light erupted around him.