Chapter 52

It is to this end that I have identified and made particular note of three distinct factions of Skybreakers, even during Nale’Elin’s days of direct leadership, and this is to be found in my third coda.

—From Words of Radiance, chapter 40, page 2

N oura the vizier left the tent the moment Adolin arrived with his armorers. She gave him one quick look, her lips downturned, then she was gone. Adolin had to assume she’d spent time trying to persuade Yanagawn not to go forward with battle training. However, the young monarch stood and smiled, then quickly waved Adolin forward.

They had no idea what they were getting in him, Adolin thought. A complete wildcard. Elevating a pauper to emperor. It’s like something from one of the old stories.

“You’ll really let me wear it?” Yanagawn said, cooing over the armor.

“I lend it to my armor standbys all the time,” Adolin said. “Plus, it shouldn’t be needed for the next hour or so.”

Yanagawn rubbed his hands, eyes wide and mischievous, hat with its long sweeping sides waggling as he moved. “Let’s do it!”

“Let’s clear some space then,” Adolin said. The large tent was cluttered with furnishings, from rugs to couches, to tables piled with glass, gold, and aluminum. Bowls, sphere goblets, portraits of the Herald Jezrien—painted in Azir as a regal Makabaki.

“There’s space over here,” Yanagawn said, hurrying to an open section of carpet.

“Excellency,” Adolin said, “that’s not nearly enough space for a man wearing Plate for the first time. If you value any of this stuff, I suggest you have it cleared away. Trust me.”

“Oh!” Yanagawn clapped and pointed, and servants appeared and got to it.

Adolin would have preferred to do this out in the square, but his gut said that would be pushing too far. Some of the guards seemed to have swapped out the moment Adolin arrived. So, only the most trusted guards and Yanagawn’s close servants were in the tent. They could … pretend not to see him going so far against tradition. Parading him out before the entire army and city would be another thing entirely. A man’s first time in Plate could be a little awkward, even if Zahel wasn’t around to make you jump off buildings onto your head.

“So …” Yanagawn said, glancing down at his ornate robes. When he stretched his arms out to the sides, layers of cloth strung like wings between his arms and torso. His robes weren’t divided, and his headdress was … well, roughly the size of a small cottage.

“You’ll need to change,” Adolin said, waving to Geb.

The head armorer tossed the emperor a thick gambeson and padded hose for wearing underneath Plate. “This should fit.”

“Excellent,” Yanagawn said, pointing to them all. “I dub these men chosen for the day, granted leave of viewership, blessed by my imperial presence.”

“Um … thanks?” Adolin asked.

“It means,” an Azish soldier whispered, “that you are allowed in the great Prime’s presence during intimate times. A blessing bestowed upon a certain number of common people every day, in order that they might experience his majesty and participate in our governance.”

Adolin looked to the one who had spoken—a man with short black hair. He had the most impressive mustache, bushy and thick. It went out more than it did down.

“Thanks,” Adolin said, then hesitated as the emperor’s clothiers began stripping him. “Uh … should we go?”

“Didn’t you hear what I said?” the soldier said. “You’re blessed. I mean, he did it for convenience, it appears—but who would question the Prime’s decisions?” He winked.

“Ah,” Adolin said. “I think my father talked about this. People watch him sleep at night, right?”

“And eat. And bathe. And everything else. The emperor is a symbol of the health of our nation.”

What an odd people. Talking directly to Yanagawn was seen as insulting—but he’d strip in front of strangers?

“They say you’re good at towers,” the friendly guard said.

“I’ve been known to play a game now and then,” Adolin said, leaning back against a sofa that had been upended to make room.

“What variety?”

“Flat Face,” Adolin said.

The guard nodded. He held his formal pose, carrying an impressive Azish ceremonial polearm. “The best for strategic planning. But it is a little mundane.”

“Mundane?” Adolin asked. “It’s a classic. You prefer Stacks?”

“Yaezir, no!” the man said. “Deliverer is my favorite. If not Vanquish.”

“Heard of both. Never tried them.” Adolin had never figured out why there were so many variants on the rule set of such a simple game.

“You should try sometime,” the guard said. “Both are good preparations for the actual interesting variations, like Crosswise Chull or Bubbly Belch.”

Adolin eyed him. Surely those were made up. The guard kept his pose, staring straight forward, a smile on his lips. Soon Yanagawn was ready, and the armorers approached with the Plate. Geb glanced at Adolin, who nodded, and then they started suiting up the emperor.

Yanagawn looked so much more ordinary in the training clothing—less like a … flower arrangement at a funeral, more like a person. Not even two years before, he’d been a common thief. Now people watched him bathe, while others literally dressed and fed him.

Every man needed a chance to stand tall and learn he could withstand a punch. Or … well, maybe not every man. Renarin would probably explain that there were very few things every man needed, whatever society said, and Adolin did try to listen.

I hope you’re well, Renarin, Adolin thought. Once, he could always count on Renarin being nearby—but now he was Radiant, and although he wasn’t a Windrunner, he was learning to fly. While Adolin just kept going as he always had. Same old Adolin.

“I’d always heard,” Yanagawn said, staring at his booted feet, “that Plate resizes to the individual. I hadn’t imagined it would be so comfortable though.” Awespren gathered around him—blue smoke rings—and hovered as the armorers locked on each new piece, which indeed resized. Mostly. The breastplate and greaves were both a little long on him, and he’d be better off with a deliberate resizing. You could shatter a piece, then regrow it on someone, to get a more exact fit.

This was close enough for now. Adolin watched with pleasure as the arm pieces locked in, then Geb handed Yanagawn the helmet. He slid it on, and it sealed in place. Storms, but Adolin could remember the first time he’d put on Plate. That electric sense of power, that strength, that feeling of invulnerability. He waved to Geb, who—with his assistants—dragged in a few practice dummies.

“Have at it,” Adolin said to the emperor.

“It?”

Adolin nodded to the dummies. “Pretend they wrote a really terrible essay, full of …” What made an essay bad? “… Poetry?”

“Huh?” Geb asked. “Poetry?”

“There’s prose and poetry,” Adolin said. “They’re opposites or something; my wife talked about it. So if you tried to write an essay and filled it with poetry, you’ve failed, right?”

The friendly guard from earlier was snickering. Yanagawn, however, tried to attack the training dummies. He launched forward with too eager a step though, and the Plate’s inherent strength sent him stumbling until he fell on his face.

The guards immediately moved to help.

“Stop!” Adolin said, hands out to block them. “You want to get yourselves killed?”

“But—” the friendly guard said.

“He’s fine,” Adolin said. “Aren’t you, Excellency?”

Yanagawn was laughing as he climbed to his hands and knees. “That’s amazing!” he said. “ Amazing! Even my steps are stronger. How high could I jump?”

“I’d suggest you try,” Adolin said, with a smile, “but you’d probably topple the tent when you hit the roof. Take it easy as you stand up, Excellency.”

Geb’s men were ready with hooks to steer Yanagawn if he strayed too close to anyone. A Shardbearer first using his Plate could be dangerous—as evidenced when Yanagawn stood up and swung his arms to the sides to balance. Those sweeps of armored hands could throw a man across the room.

Fortunately, Geb and his men had done this many times. They carefully steered some servants away, giving the emperor plenty of space to practice walking. He got that part quickly; most people did. Finally he approached the dummies, and with joyspren swirling around his arms, punched each dummy in turn, blasting them to splinters and shards.

“That is,” Yanagawn said, his voice echoing in his helm, “the single most satisfying thing I’ve ever done.”

“Great,” Adolin said as Geb handed him some wooden training eggs. “Here, catch these.”

Yanagawn turned, and managed not to stumble as he located Adolin, who carefully threw one of the wooden eggs across the room. They were exactly the right size to grip in the hand, three inches across, and though Yanagawn missed the first two, he caught the third.

And immediately smashed it while trying to hold it.

“Wow,” the emperor said.

“Wearing Plate,” Adolin said, “isn’t so much about learning how to do damage. That part is easy. Learning not to break everything? Well that takes practice. Once you can learn to direct your force, you truly become dangerous.”

He tossed Yanagawn another sphere, which the emperor caught—then crushed.

“That’s so difficult!” the younger man said, as if both delighted and surprised.

Adolin smiled, and nodded for Geb to give some practical instructions accompanied by simple exercises. Yanagawn took to it with eagerness as Adolin settled on a chair stacked on another one, while Donalar—an officer with light blue eyes who was the third generation of that name in the Cobalt Guard—arrived to tell him there was still no movement from the enemy.

His meal was ready—merely some chouta in a wrap, to keep him on the move. He ate, wishing Shallan were here. They often ate together, ignoring proprieties of gendered dining. He missed the quips, the silliness mixed with truly poignant questions about his day, his feelings, his choices.

The guard from before, the one with the bristly mustache, watched Yanagawn with interest. “You want to take a turn?” Adolin asked him around a bite of chouta.

“I’ve trained on one of the imperial sets,” the man said. “Most of the guards have. Just in case.”

Made sense. As Kaminah was learning her job quickly—and had sent him several chouta wraps, with the implication he needed to keep eating—he held up one to the guard. “Want some?”

“No eating on watch,” he said, his eyes on the emperor. “Aren’t you going to teach him towers?”

“Planning to once he can sit down without falling over,” Adolin said. “He’s a quick learner though. Hey, Excellency!”

Yanagawn turned, curious.

“Come and sit,” Adolin said, pointing. “We’ll start your tactical training.”

“While wearing Plate?” the emperor asked.

“The more you wear it,” Adolin said, “the more natural it will feel—and small movements like playing a card game will teach you control.”

The emperor tromped over and managed to sit on the floor without falling. Adolin grabbed a low table—designed for use while sitting on the ground—and hauled it in front of Yanagawn. Then he turned to the friendly guard.

“You’ve got a deck?” he asked the man.

“Why assume I carry one on me?”

“You seem the type.”

The man grinned, then fished one out of the pouch at his side, all while keeping at alert attention.

“I hope,” Adolin said, settling himself at the table, “you don’t lose too much of your weekly wages at cards.”

“Lose?” the man said from behind. “Not sure I know that word, foreigner. Must be an Alethi thing.”

Adolin chuckled, shuffling the large cards. “Is he always this entertaining?”

“He … isn’t allowed to talk to me,” Yanagawn admitted.

Oh, right. “Is that hard?”

“The hardest part, Adolin. Harder than being a spectacle. Harder by far than my lessons. It’s the only thing I truly miss from the old days.”

Adolin leaned across the small table. “Next time we’re in Urithiru, I’ll have Shallan make an illusory decoy for you to entertain the scribes. We’ll sneak you out for a night—go to some winehouses, play some cards, hit a party.”

“Ha!” Yanagawn said. Then after a moment said, “Wait. That wasn’t a joke.”

“Storming right it wasn’t a joke; it was a promise.” Adolin held up the deck. “You’ve really never played?”

“No,” Yanagawn said. “My uncle never let me play any card games. Said I’d lose my shoes, then his shoes.”

“Well,” Adolin said, “towers is versatile, but I’m going to teach you a version called Flat Face. Not because you have to keep from laughing—but because each card does exactly what the glyphs indicate.”

“There are versions where that isn’t the case?”

“Most of them, in fact,” Adolin said. “I’m going to give you cards, which you should hide from me. You can look at your hand, and you deploy cards as armies on the table. Maneuver your troops, change their capacities according to the armies you deploy next to them. Choose when to attack, when to retreat a card back to your hand. The winner is whoever eliminates all opposing cards—or who forces his opponent to give up.”

“Why would you ever give up?” Yanagawn asked. “Why not fight until you’re beaten?”

“That is an excellent question,” Adolin said. “Often in towers you try for best of three—and you can permanently lose cards in earlier skirmishes. Many versions require betting, and the more you commit, the higher the bets.”

“So … you would retreat if you want to preserve your cards for the next fight. Or if you think the risk is too high to try for victory?” Yanagawn hesitated. “But you never retreat when there is only one battle, and all is already wagered. Correct?”

Adolin smiled. “You are going to be the best student I’ve ever had, Excellency.”

Yanagawn nodded his helmeted head. Then he carefully reached up and took the helm off. He set it to the side, deeply considering something. Was it the cards?

“Would it be all right,” the emperor asked softly, “if I asked you to call me by my name?” He met Adolin’s eyes. “It will give the viziers heart attacks though. I don’t want to cause you trouble.”

“Yanagawn,” Adolin said, dealing the cards, “I’ve been breaking the hearts of scribes since I was fourteen. I’ll manage. You ready?”

“Yes. Absolutely!”

Kaladin finished making the evening stew. He and Szeth had flown much of the distance to the next monastery, where they hoped to find more answers. But going in at night didn’t sound wise. Kaladin was eager to be moving forward, but at the same time, rushing seemed wrong. He feared pushing Szeth too much. Pushing himself too much … well, he’d learned how dangerous that could be. So as the stew cooked—smelling almost acceptable now that he had some fresh peppers—Kaladin decided to practice the flute.

It was strange, to be sitting near this gurgling river in the night, surrounded by empty grasslands, simply playing. His life since reaching adulthood—before it, really—had been a nonstop sprint. Event after event, almost every one a disaster. He’d stopped only when forced to rest.

Now something peaceful within him wanted to call to mind their faces. Friends he’d lost. Friends whose fates he didn’t know. Women he’d loved. Others who had loved him. Never the two intersecting, as was the perverse way of his life.

He remembered nights as a slave, trembling and huddled by the wall. Other nights planning, letting himself build idealistic dreams of freedom. He remembered nights around the stewpot with Bridge Four, and others trying to stay awake on guard duty. He remembered, as a blur, those broken days after the fall of Kholinar when it had all caught up to him.

He remembered a beautiful woman made of blue light, standing with a brilliant sword and cutting through the darkness as death itself came crawling for him in the shape of a thousand spined monsters. And he remembered his father’s embrace at the end of a long black tunnel.

Through it all, he played his flute. Poorly. The notes just wouldn’t form right, and his fingers felt like they were made of stone. He tried again and again. He’d learned the spear. He’d learned to face the darkness of his mind. He could learn to control this simple piece of wood.

Yet it resisted him with all the might of Bridge Four combined. More stubborn than any slave or lighteyes.

Kaladin sighed, lowering the flute. Syl settled down beside him, full sized. “You’re getting better. Listening isn’t painful anymore!”

He gave her a flat stare.

“Listening isn’t agonizingly painful anymore!” she said.

Kaladin sighed and gazed out to a tall hillside, where Szeth stood in front of the first moon, inspecting the landscape. “I keep thinking about how Wit made this flute play music back to him.”

“Yeah,” she said. “The story of the Wandersail. When he played it, the echoes of it bouncing around in the chasms continued afterward.”

“I always wondered why he told me that story. The story about a people who followed a king who was, in the top of his tower, dead. About a people who learned their actions were their own responsibility. Seems odd, doesn’t it? I already knew that the lighteyes weren’t as valorous as they claimed, and that my actions were my own.”

“Maybe it wasn’t about the lighteyes,” she said, “but other forces you let steer you.”

Kaladin nodded. “It was surreal. Wit would stop playing, then the music would return, continuing as he talked.” He looked at the flute. “Before we left Urithiru, he implied that would happen for me. When I learned to play it not with my lips, but with my heart. I can’t fathom what that might mean.”

“He can be frustrating,” Syl said. “If the world survives this, I’ll see if I can hide something extra annoying in his sock drawer.” She smiled, but then put her hand on his knee. “You … all right?”

“I’m fine,” he promised. “Just thinking. When I needed him, Wit was always there. But he told me I would have to make my own story this time.” He shrugged. “When the darkness consumed me, he pulled me free. So maybe I can listen to him today.”

“That’s a remarkably mature perspective,” Syl said. “I feel a little silly about the sock drawer wisecrack now.”

Kaladin merely smiled as Szeth strode back to them. “That next town is very clearly corrupted,” the man said. “They hid inside all day, but are out now at night. Some are working the fields, but many are moving in the darkness toward Koring, the town where people are normal. Likely to try breaking in.”

“Should we help?” Kaladin asked.

“Koring survived two years,” Szeth said. “They can rebuff another assault, particularly now that they don’t have to worry about any attacks from the Encilo region.” He knelt beside the small fire and tasted the stew. He grunted.

“Better?” Kaladin asked.

“Your Eastern ways have corrupted my sense of taste,” Szeth said. “I shouldn’t enjoy this much pepper.”

Storms, but that man knew how to backhand a compliment. Still, Szeth served up quite a large bowl of stew, then wandered away to eat it on a tree stump.

Kaladin held up the flute. Wit said Kaladin needed to find himself—to discover who he was when he wasn’t slavishly trying to protect everyone else. Something had … loosened in Kaladin when he’d let go of Tien’s death, and Teft’s death as well.

That didn’t solve the problem entirely though—here he was, doing the same thing. Dedicating everything he had to helping Szeth. Should he stop helping? That couldn’t be the right answer.

At Syl’s urging, he got out their copy of The Way of Kings, so she could read him a chapter, with him turning the pages. After that, she—concentrating earnestly—wrote out their daily report to send home via spanreed, which Szeth commonly did. Today he seemed focused on his meal and thoughts, so Kaladin—somewhat grudgingly—took the spanreed pen and traced her words.

“It’s not writing to copy writing!” Syl insisted.

“Feels like writing,” Kaladin grumbled.

She watched him work by the light of a sphere, beaming. Her joy at being able to scribe infected him, and he ended up not minding so much.

“How are you doing?” he asked her as he worked, lying on the ground with the spanreed board before him, tracing through a very thin piece of paper what she’d written beneath. “About your goals.”

“Not living just for you?” she said.

“Yeah,” Kaladin whispered. “Because I’m having a storming hard time figuring out how to both help people and not help people all at once.”

“You just need to live for yourself. That’s what the flute was about, wasn’t it?”

“I can’t be certain,” he said, “that I’m not doing that to please Wit. Would I ever have chosen that on my own?”

“Would I ever have chosen to write on my own?” she asked, leaning down beside him. “But I did, and I love it.” She whispered to him, “I’m keeping a journal. It’s private and I’m doing it. ”

He looked up at her smile.

“I returned to the Physical Realm,” she told him, “because I enjoy it here. I like the wind, the colors, the infinite blue sky and the warm close sun. I like the Radiant bond, because I like participating. I remind myself of that. I’m a person, and I chose.”

“Rule number one,” Kaladin whispered.

“Exactly. What about you? Are you a thing, Kaladin, or a person? Do you move merely because your instincts tell you, or do you choose to help?”

“Both, sometimes,” he admitted. “Like with Bridge Four, in the early days. I had this … mental need to help, so when I failed, it broke me. Even more than the loss of a dear friend should have, because I was so defined by the idea of protecting others.” He finished writing and changed the paper, in case a message came for them. “Still, I genuinely want to help.”

“Rough,” Syl said quietly. “Because, like me, the problem you and the real you are all mixed up together.”

“Yeah,” he said. “How do I find what I need if the world is constantly in crisis?” He heaved out a sigh, then glanced to the side as a small exhaustionspren appeared nearby: like a little jet of dust, smaller than most. Quivering.

“This one’s afraid too,” Kaladin said. “There are so few spren here, and they always seem like this.”

“I keep hearing things,” Syl said. “Hushed things shuffling in the shadows, moving on the wind, hiding within the silence. There are spren here we don’t see. They’re … softer than they are in the East.”

“Like the Wind,” Kaladin said.

“I’ve been pondering that,” Syl said. “You know the Old Magic?”

“The Nightwatcher,” he said.

“She was formed of the Old Magic,” Syl said, sounding wistful as she leaned back, hovering an inch off the grassy hillside, her head tipped up to gaze at the violet moon. “She’s synonymous with it now. We call it old because it—they—are the spren that existed before we were created. The ancient spren of Roshar, predating humans and even singers.”

“The Wind said that she couldn’t speak until recently,” Kaladin said. “Something about Odium, and maybe how people perceived her.”

“Emotion spren and windspren came from the Old Magic,” Syl said. “Before humans were here, or the ten groups of Radiant spren were created. I think the oldest spren must all be mostly forgotten. Overwhelmed, crowded out, like whispers in a room full of shouting people. The Night. The Stone. And the Wind. They’re ancient. Older than the gods …”

The spanreed started writing. A short message directly from Wit, which Syl read. Wit was apparently still covering for the Bondsmiths while they searched for answers in the Spiritual Realm. But he “totally had it handled” and “no one should worry at all.” Which was, of course, worrying. Fighting had started with the Fused at the Shattered Plains, but there were no casualties among Bridge Four. Adolin was holding Azimir. Jasnah would leave for Thaylen City soon, though enemy forces weren’t expected there for a few days yet.

Kaladin was tempted to write back and demand help with his personal problems. But Wit ended with, “Write your story. Listen to the Wind.” Storming man. He knew.

Kaladin leaned back and attempted to listen to the Wind now. He found only the sound of the leaves and the brook chattering away. He closed his eyes, trying to remember the last time he’d done something that had been purely for him, purely peaceful. If he could be doing anything at that moment, what would it be? What would make him happy? He let himself answer truthfully.

He wanted to go dancing with Syl.

“Hey,” he said to her, “feel like a kata?”

“Sure,” she said, perking up.

Kaladin propelled himself off the ground, leaving the spanreed board and that cursed flute. He tossed off his jacket, and didn’t let it bother him that if he worked up a sweat, he’d need to do extra laundry in that stream the next day.

For now, he just wanted to be like those ancient spren. Exist as the simplest version of himself: with a spear in hand.

He fell into a stance, and as soon as he snapped into position, Syl vanished from her human form and came to him, dropping into his hand as a long, silvery spear. One kata alone felt appropriate, the one they called the Chasm Kata. That training dance he’d done so long ago, the first time he’d shown Bridge Four what he could do.

For a time after that, he’d refused to wield a weapon. Using a pole with no spearhead instead had freed him. Likewise, Syl … she wasn’t a weapon. Not tonight. A living Shardblade could take whatever shape you wanted, and today the shape was of a spear—but not a weapon.

Tonight, his dance wasn’t about killing, or even about training. It was about the kata, and his love for what he’d learned. He spun the spear, adding in every flourish he knew, the kinds that would get you killed on a battlefield—but that didn’t matter. Because he wasn’t on a battlefield, and this wasn’t a weapon.

Syl was a glowing silvery arc in his hands as he moved through the sequence. Each step sure, each grip perfect, stretching and straining his muscles. Just because it wasn’t practical didn’t mean it wasn’t difficult. He spun, whipping the spear into attacks. Then—as he leaned forward, thrusting the spear in a long one-handed lunge—the shape of it fuzzed, and he was holding her hand.

He spun Syl, her skirt flaring as he moved through the next step of the kata. He’d never learned to dance, not properly. Tarah had laughed when she’d found out, and so he’d never told anyone else. When would stern Kaladin Stormblessed ever have time for dancing? He was too busy saving the world.

This was different. This he could do, because there was no wrong way. He merely had to do what felt right. He spun with Syl, then yanked her back, spear landing securely in his left hand as he added steps to the kata. The springy ground seemed to propel his spins, as if he were light as air. He whipped the spear to the side and Syl unfolded, rotating in a spin, her hand in his. Faintly touching.

A part of him wanted to feel foolish. Wanted to worry about tomorrow, when Szeth would have to face an Elsecaller, with powers nearly as arcane as those of a Bondsmith. Should he be planning for that? Kaladin almost stopped.

Then he remembered what he’d said to Szeth about warrior thoughts. Could he honestly help Szeth if he wasn’t willing to do the same himself? Did he truly believe those practices would work? Kaladin took a deep breath, then battered back those emotions, presenting counterthoughts like parts of the kata. Syl formed into a spear as he spun, then he used the momentum to launch the weapon—throwing it in a glowing silver line directly through a nearby tree trunk.

I deserve peace.

The spear formed in his hand again, but then was Syl, laughing as they danced.

I deserve to be happy.

He tossed her as a spear from one hand, then caught her as a woman—Syl choosing when to be which, but him sensing each change. They turned, whirling, two hands holding two hands.

I will enjoy this. I will let myself enjoy living.

The darkness didn’t die, but it retreated as all darkness did before light. And as they twirled, Syl’s laughter calling to the sky, the Wind arrived and began dancing with them. The Wind began moving them both. Pushing him this way, then that. A swirling, gusting, powerful force. Alive, guiding his steps.

I remember this, Kaladin thought. From my childhood. I remember moving, and the Wind joining me. I remember … peace and freedom.

He danced through it, and Syl danced with him, both riding the eddies of the Wind. And if he’d ever known a perfect moment in his life—crystallized joy, like light made into something you could hold—this was it. Worries abandoned. No, worries battered away. Worries refused.

In that—at the edge of the world and the advent of the end of all things—Kaladin Stormblessed allowed himself to be happy. For what felt like the first time since Tien’s death.

He came to the end of the dance, dipping low, holding Syl as a spear, then a woman, then as pure light. Distant thunder. Wind that continued to gust around them.

Followed by sound. From the flute.

Kaladin spun, and then—Syl at his side as a woman—ran for it. He grabbed the flute and held it as the swirling Wind blew across the holes, sending out fitful half-sounds. He drew that Wind in, and felt it churning within him, like Stormlight energizing his lungs. He blew. The note: pure and clean.

He played then. Not perfectly. Far from it. He was new to this, but like the kata, he didn’t bother with what he should be doing. He played what felt right; what came next. The music that Wit had left him to learn—the song of the Wandersail —provided a framework, a backbone, as Kaladin played. Some notes strong, others faltering, but growing better with each repetition.

He wanted this. He wanted it because this was a challenge, something to learn, something different. Stuffy, grumpy Kaladin. He didn’t have time for music or love or life. That was the story. The story he’d been telling himself for so long.

Tonight, he wrote a different story for himself. Of a man who loved music. Of a man who had time for music. He found in it some piece of his soul that had always been missing, a loss he’d never had words to explain. He learned a new language that night, full of new adjectives for who Kaladin was, and who he could be.

He finished, and the Wind rushed away, carrying the last notes into the night. The sounds didn’t return to him, but the Wind did seem to keep hold of them for safekeeping. He looked at Syl, whose smile was made of light, and he grinned. He let himself grin. Happiness was a part of what defined Kaladin.

He lingered on her face, kept worries at bay with a shield wall of proactive thoughts, for a remarkable length of time, until finally he turned to see what Szeth thought of the music.

The man was not there. He’d left the stump where he’d been eating. The sky was empty of him, though his pack—including the two Honorblades and Nightblood—lay near the fire.

“Huh,” Kaladin said. “Did you see where he went?”

Yanagawn indeed proved an extremely capable student, picking up the game quickly. Moreover, he appeared to have a sixth sense for the battlefield lessons each of the early training scenarios were meant to instruct.

“So,” Yanagawn said, “it really is worse to deploy everything at once, with nothing in reserve. While it makes a show of force, which sounds most likely to win, your mistakes magnify—and you don’t have any flexibility to reset if things get out of hand.”

“Exactly!” Adolin said, chewing on his second roll of chouta, as he knew he’d be chastised otherwise. He tapped the table in front of them—which was now cracked after Yanagawn had placed a card too forcefully and split the wood. After that they’d removed the Plate, leaving the emperor in a warrior’s gambeson with a robe over the top. “Plus, you need reserves to be able to counter your opponent, and you need to be able to play to the terrain if the battlefield moves.”

“Or,” Yanagawn said, studying the board, “a company you thought strong might have a bad break and flounder. If you’ve committed everything, the way I just did, you can’t shore up weak points.”

“Excellent. Now, other than that, why did you lose?”

“You were able to surround me,” he replied, “and a surrounded army is weaker.”

“It can’t rest its troops in back lines as effectively,” Adolin said, “and has to waste energy watching its flanks, then fighting on them. So you got surrounded—and then were so overly committed that you didn’t have any reserves to break through and rescue your troops.”

Yanagawn nodded, then eyed a large upright clock. “You have to go, don’t you?”

“Afraid so,” Adolin said. “I’m on duty—and the enemy is very likely to attack soon.”

“I’d love to know how you figured that out,” Yanagawn replied. “Can I learn it from cards?”

“You can hone your instincts with the cards,” Adolin said. “But the rest requires practical experience. We’ll get you there.” He then held out his hand.

Yanagawn hesitantly took it. A few of the servants gasped, but Adolin ignored them.

“It’s tradition,” Adolin said, “to give a handshake across the table after a game. One last lesson for tonight: Don’t ever get mad at a person you’re sparring with, especially when they defeat you. Their victory is training for you. More importantly, you need to be the kind of person the best duelists want to fight—because if you only ever face people you can beat, then you’ll never improve.”

“Thank you,” Yanagawn said, standing up. “For all of it, Adolin.” He paused. “How is it you’re not Radiant?”

Adolin covered a wince. That question.

That storming question.

“Everyone says you’re the best fighter in the army,” Yanagawn continued. “And everyone loves you.”

“I wish that were true, Yanagawn. I can think of quite a few who don’t.”

“Regardless. Why?”

“I …” One factor was that he would not abandon Maya, and becoming Radiant would require that, he’d been told. But beyond that … “I don’t like the oaths,” Adolin admitted. Voicing it for the first time.

“What?” Yanagawn said. “I thought good Vorin people were all about oaths.”

Adolin shrugged, rising. “My father made oaths, and so did all the highprinces, before the Radiants were refounded—back when they were all burning down villages and slaughtering people. Their actions were considered honorable because they kept their storming oaths. Who cares about the suffering they caused, right? Everyone was honorable! That’s what matters!”

Yanagawn, instead of being taken aback by the rising angerspren at Adolin’s feet, pondered this with a solemn expression.

“Too many people,” Adolin said as his armorers began to put on his Plate, “think the oath, and not what it means, is the important part. I heard something in one of my lessons once, from an ardent. About a man who took an oath to sit in a chair until told he could stand—and he stayed there for ten years.”

“Wow,” Yanagawn said. “That’s impressive.”

“It’s idiocy,” Adolin said. “Pardon, Yanagawn—everyone celebrated him, but it’s pure idiocy. You know what I’d admire? A man who gave an oath, then realized it was storming stupid and broke it—apologized—and moved on with his life, determined not to make that kind of mistake again.”

“Some might call that hypocrisy.”

“No, it would just be—”

Adolin cut off. Sometimes a hypocrite is just a man in the process of changing. Storming Dalinar Kholin had written that in his storming book. People quoted it all the time.

Dalinar was always there, everywhere Adolin looked.

“Very well,” Yanagawn said, “no oaths between us. Merely two men doing their best.”

Adolin nodded, then leaned forward—his lower half now armored—and thumbed over his shoulder. “That fellow with the mustache. Who is he?”

“Commandant’s son,” Yanagawn whispered. “Gezamal.”

“Good to know,” Adolin whispered. But before he could say more, the Thaylen man—Hmask—was announced at the tent. He waved to Adolin, carrying a letter from one of the scribes.

Adolin didn’t need it. He could hear the distant shouts. The enemy had arrived, exactly as predicted. He held out his arms, and the armorers hurriedly finished suiting him up.