Chapter 72

I realize this is, in a way, ridiculous. I, who proclaim a god to be dead, am also the one who rejects the idea that no God exists. And yet my very being—soul, mind, body—rebels at the idea that nothing out there cares. It must.

—From the epilogue to Oathbringer, by Dalinar Kholin

W hile Szeth recovered some gemstones from a stash here in the monastery, Sylphrena appeared again beside Kaladin—human size, because it felt right. She regarded the collection of acolytes who had been standing with illusions over them. People. Moss had used real people in his test. How unnecessarily cruel. Illusions didn’t need a person to stick to; Shallan made them freestanding all the time.

Once Szeth returned with the infused gemstones, Syl floated with him and Kaladin out to the front of the monastery. There, Nale glanced at her. Glared? He wasn’t frowning. Could you glare without a frown? Perhaps she should ask some angerspren.

She smiled at Nale. Sweetly, because a little sweetness enhanced basically any situation. Especially the ones where it made someone annoyed.

Szeth studied his newly won Honorblade, pausing on the stone porch outside the monastery. Behind, in the hall, the poor acolytes began to stumble and hug one another, freed from the darkness. Kaladin squatted by Szeth as he unwrapped their increasingly bulky pack of swords, then slid this new one in among them—and Nightblood quietly asked it if it could become dull for their travels.

“I’m impressed,” Kaladin said to Szeth. “How did you figure out that riddle?”

“I had the blessings of the spren,” Szeth said.

Nale—standing with hands clasped behind himself like a giant stone statue—glared at her even more intently. How strange, this feeling. That of perking up beneath a glare. Ruining that man’s day was basically the best thing ever.

Except … why did her mind keep drifting back to that oddity of using servants behind the illusions? Stupid brain. It couldn’t let go of ideas sometimes, and other times it was so full of silly ideas, it couldn’t pick one.

Szeth had won.

Except …

To win this test, the Lightweaver had said, you must choose a version of me, strike with your Blade through the eye, and kill me. Then you must escape my monastery with my Blade.

Then you must escape with my Blade …

“Well,” Kaladin said. “I’m glad it wasn’t me in there. I think I’d have gone mad.”

“No,” Syl said, forcing herself back to the moment, and crouched down beside him near the Blades. “ Your spren would have helped you. Which is how the bond is supposed to work. We both give, and we both get. A symbiosis, like the pictures that Shallan showed me of cremlings.”

“What do cremlings have to do with this?” Kaladin said, frowning.

“Everything,” Syl said.

Szeth tied the bundle of cloth-wrapped swords, then stood up as people began to flood out of the monastery, falling to their knees, weeping. As in other places they’d visited. It felt more … intimate here, in this little chasmlike ravine, with the stream trickling behind Nale.

These people surrounded Szeth on the open rock patio in front of the monastery. A location that felt a lot like ordinary Roshar, with stone on the ground, almost no mud or dirt. A holy place, although why the spren of rocks got so much devotion here was beyond her. Rock spren were almost as stupid as stick spren, and that was saying something.

Though the stone itself has ancient memories, she thought. Of a land that once knew the touch of neither human nor singer …

Kaladin stood up, smiling at Szeth. He liked this part, she knew, because it reminded Szeth that he was fighting for something. Because ideals were stupid unless there were people behind them. So strange that an entire order of Radiants didn’t understand that.

Syl wanted to flit off into the air and go looking for lifespren, as she thought some might be here in this almost-right place with the stream and the trees.

But her brain. Her stupid brain.

Her brain kept thinking about Moss. He’d thought himself so smart, and now he was dead. So there.

Her brain latched on. Like with jaws.

Holding. Tight. Squeezing.

Twenty-nine of those standing here are innocuous; one of those standing here is deadly. Twenty-nine posed no threat, but one of those standing was deadly. The Lightweaver hadn’t been standing; he’d been lying down.

She looked at Szeth, with his too-shiny, too-hairless head. Twenty-nine of the people standing weren’t dangerous … but was one of them deadly still? Someone who made a riddle like this seemed the type who would try to get the wording exactly right. Would he also be the type to hide two riddles in one?

This is your true test …

Syl bolted upright, then grabbed Kaladin by the arm. Actually grabbed him. With full force.

He glanced at her, shocked.

“Kaladin,” Syl hissed. “One of those acolytes is going to try to kill Szeth.”

He blinked, took it in.

And trusted her.

Without a moment’s hesitation, Kaladin summoned the spear. She went, her substance flowing into the weapon, her awareness becoming his. In those moments she overlapped with him, saw through his eyes. It wasn’t exact. She had an awareness that wasn’t precisely his.

Never were they closer than in these moments when Kaladin—bless him—just trusted her. He took the spear in two hands and saw it. A flash in the air as one of the people fawning over Szeth—a matronly woman—summoned a Blade, raised her arms to strike at Szeth’s back …

And was speared straight through the ear by Kaladin.

Her eyes burned and she collapsed. Around them, people cried out and scattered.

Szeth, belatedly, spun around.

“Cheating,” Nale said, his voice calm. “The Windrunner has helped you.”

Szeth stared at the dead woman, who evaporated into smoke. He knelt reverently and picked up her Blade: long and curved, with an intricate design near the hilt. “The Truthwatcher Honorbearer? I don’t know her. What of Vambra-daughter-Skies? She was so young …”

Szeth blinked, then looked to Kaladin, who looked to Syl, who appeared full sized as Kaladin dismissed his spear.

“Two Honorbearers attacked you last time,” she said. “And so I thought, ‘Huh. Why would they send only one this time?’ And then I thought, ‘Szeth’s head is funny without hair.’ But then I thought, ‘Hey. The Lightweaver said that twenty-nine of the illusions standing there weren’t dangerous.’ And … um … the rest just fell into place.” She shrugged.

“You knew about this?” Kaladin said, spinning toward Nale.

“A difficult challenge will be set before Szeth-son-Neturo once his pilgrimage is done,” Nale said, not moving. “We need to know he is capable.”

“What challenge?” Kaladin demanded.

“It doesn’t matter,” Nale said. “He cheated by receiving your help. The rules have been violated.”

“What rules?” Szeth said softly.

Syl turned slowly, Kaladin doing likewise, to where Szeth knelt holding the new Honorblade. The air was strangely quiet, now that the servants of the monastery had fled. Szeth looked up and met Nale’s eyes.

“What rules did I violate,” Szeth said, “Nin-son-God?”

“The rules of pilgrimage.”

“When Pozen drew me into Shadesmar …” Szeth whispered, “I asked about the rules. He said that there are no set rules for this challenge. If there were, I could not have been attacked by two Honorbearers at a time. Correct?”

Nale did not reply.

“Nor could I have been attacked outside the boundaries of the monastery itself.” Szeth stood and nodded to Kaladin. “This man has been assigned to help me. As he did his job, and since there are no rules for this pilgrimage … I do not see how any could have been violated. Sir.”

Syl whistled softly at the complete lack of emotion in Szeth’s voice. The two faced one another, black uniform and white. Until Nale spoke.

“You are correct and I was wrong,” Nale said. “The pilgrimage continues. Bear your prizes with pride. Come. We will visit the Truthwatcher monastery as a formality, then continue to the final three. They will be the most difficult for you, each a unique test.”

“That’s it?” Syl demanded, a fury rising within. She wasn’t a windspren, but she sure could feel like a storm when she wanted. “That’s it ?”

“What more do you want when a man is wrong?” Nale asked, calm, then turned and walked toward the steps.

Syl started toward him, but stopped as Kaladin caught her eyes and shook his head. So she let the storming man go. Szeth carefully wrapped the newest sword—making six of them they’d captured so far—with Kaladin’s pack instead. But …

“Wait,” she said. “Three more monasteries, not counting Truthwatcher, since we have that sword already. Does that add up? We have six swords, but shouldn’t there be ten overall?”

“The Windrunner Honorblade has been corrupted,” Nale called from ahead. He turned and glided up into the air instead of climbing the steps. “Our king, Jezrien, was killed by the Windrunner traitor, Vyre. Odium took his Honorblade unto himself in that moment, corrupting it.” He stepped onto the hilltop and strode out of sight.

“Huh,” Syl said, looking at the two boys. “Did either of you know that?”

“Some of it,” Kaladin said. “Not the corrupting part.”

“I did not ask, nor do I care,” Szeth said, walking past them to the steps. Then, remarkably, he halted and came back. “I do appreciate your help. Both of you.”

He jogged to catch up to Nale. Syl folded her arms. She could feel her arms. Like she could feel her toes rub together when she had toes. She was always solid to herself.

She glanced at Kaladin, who was shaking his head. “I know,” he said to her. “I feel it too.”

“Your toes rubbing together?” she asked, cocking her head.

“My … what? No, Syl, frustration. Nale is infuriating. He doesn’t actually follow the law—he changes his perceptions, motivations, and even morals at the drop of a sphere. He acts like he’s made of iron, but the moment he’s confronted with a logical inconsistency, he either changes the conversation or walks away.”

“Kaladin, I think he’s as close to broken as Taln or Ash … maybe even more.”

“We only have four days until the contest.” He paused. “I’m … really not going to find Ishar in time to help Dalinar, am I? I’m not going to be back in time to see the contest. Wit was … Wit was right, wasn’t he?”

“I’m afraid he was,” Syl said. “But there’s a purpose for you here. Wit said so.”

Kaladin looked up. “The Wind said I have to do something important … maybe more important than the contest. At least in her opinion. But what could that possibly be?”

“Restoring Ishar, perhaps?” she said.

“Dalinar said,” Kaladin whispered, “that an oath sworn at the right time might change Ishar.” He took a deep breath, and his eyes focused on Szeth climbing the steps. “But more and more, I find myself worrying only about Szeth. Too much. Syl, it’s taking me over again. I went from being annoyed by him to hurting over how incapable I am of helping him. Just like with Bridge Four … I start feeling isolated, like I will be the only one who survives, when everyone else withers away …”

She took his arm, and with effort and concentration, made imprints in his uniform with her fingers. He saw that and smiled.

“We’re on a journey,” she said. “Between who we were, and who we want to be. Both of us.”

“I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do, though.”

“What is it you keep telling Szeth about what he needs to be doing? That following orders or laws slavishly isn’t as important as finding your own path?”

“Fine, you’re right. As usual.”

“Don’t say it that way.”

“Because?”

“Because I want to be right only when I’m right, not because it’s expected. That’s part of my journey, Kaladin.”

“To live for yourself, not only for others,” he said, “all while somehow still wanting to help me.”

“The same way you need to protect—but not make that everything about you.”

“I need to help without being obsessed.” He focused on Syl. “You truly are brilliant. Not with this alone, but with helping Szeth. You’re incredible, Syl.”

There. She’d been waiting for that. She lifted a few inches off the ground.

But don’t do it just for him, she told herself. Do it because it’s what you want.

“We find our balance, then,” Kaladin said. “Somehow.” He took a deep breath, heaved out a sigh—and took to the air to follow the other two.

Shallan paced the confines of her rooms—in the Sebarial warcamp—at the Shattered Plains. Like the previous times they’d created one of these little enclaves in the Spiritual Realm, color bled and the setting didn’t feel quite real. Rlain and Renarin were at her sitting room table, and natural light shone in from the window in her bedroom. She’d snuck out through that window on multiple occasions when first infiltrating the Ghostbloods.

Unlike the other two, Shallan—with Glys’s help—had formed a waiting area that was not her childhood bedroom. That was categorically good for them all. Though she was largely doing better, if they tried to visit that memory, they’d end up in a room with white carpet made red—and at least one corpse.

“It’s strange,” Renarin said. “I’m not tired or hungry. Glys can’t tell me how long this has taken, but we must have been in the Spiritual Realm for at least ten hours.”

“Tumi is the same,” Rlain said. “I think time is too nebulous to them. He tends to think in terms of what has been, and what will be, but not about the time frame of either.”

Renarin tapped the table with one finger. “Aunt Navani’s scholars say that matter, energy, and Stormlight are the same thing—just different states. This place seems to be made up entirely of Stormlight, or Investiture, or whatever. When we entered, did we become Stormlight as well? If so, what will happen with our bodies when we exit?”

“I guess …” Rlain said. “I guess we’ll re-form?”

“Assuming that is true,” Renarin said, glancing at her, “could we bring things with us? Re-form them from their spiritual aspect? What could we create if we mastered this place?”

It was a valid question, but one Shallan couldn’t focus on. She continued pacing.

“Still worried,” Rlain guessed, “about how to kill the Ghostbloods?”

“I’m a fool,” Shallan said. “Killing them here will be virtually impossible. They can heal, and there’s Stormlight all around. I thought anti-Light must be dangerous—but it didn’t hurt him, exactly like it didn’t hurt me.”

“Glys says …” Renarin cocked his head. The spren was invisible, hiding within him, as it sometimes did. A habit that Pattern always found fascinating. “Glys says that human souls are made of Investiture, but usually not in enough concentration to react to the anti-Light.”

“What?” Shallan asked, hurrying over to him. “You know something? What did he say?”

“He says their spren will be hurt by it,” Renarin admitted, looking away from her. “So … you could kill their spren, or seriously wound them, maybe. Might be tough to isolate them though, if they’re hiding inside a body.”

“I thought,” Rlain said to a slow, calm rhythm, “that Glys and Tumi were his. Voidlight.”

“They’re a mix,” Renarin said. “Glys says … something about a Rhythm of War …” He shook his head. “Is Tumi equally callous? About us killing his brothers or sisters?”

“We kill other humans all the time,” Shallan said, with a shrug.

“We don’t!” Renarin said, then blushed. “I mean, I don’t … Still, I do find all of this fascinating. Light. Anti-Light. Investiture. Energy.”

“Is that why your father always wanted you to be an ardent?” Rlain said to the Rhythm of Curiosity. “This way of asking questions and thinking such interesting thoughts?”

“Yeah,” Renarin said. “I don’t know if I refused just so I could resist what was expected, or if becoming an ardent felt like giving up on my father’s hopes for me when I was young.”

“You don’t have to live up to anyone’s expectations, Renarin,” Shallan said, stopping near him, the strangely saturated light spilling in through the window over her.

“I know,” he said. “We always say things like that, Shallan, those of us on the outside. It’s true enough. I don’t have to conform, become a warrior and a highprince the way everyone expects of my father’s sons. Yet I worry that in our zeal, we forget that merely because something is more standard or conventional, that doesn’t make it bad.

“My values are shaped by those around me, whom I respect. That makes it impossible to separate what my father wants of me from what I want for myself—his ideals have in large part become my ideals. To try to separate myself completely from those influences would also be a rejection of who I am. And … I’m doing it again. Getting lost in my own thoughts.” He looked to Rlain for support.

“I find this aspect of you to be fascinating,” Rlain said. “I’ve never really considered where I got my ideals.” He put his hand on the table, close to Renarin’s.

Do not, Shallan thought at herself, get distracted by their flirting. She had to save the world. She left them for the moment, approaching Pattern, who stood in the doorway to the bedroom. “Those two,” she said as she passed, “are way too distracted.”

“Mmm …” Pattern said.

“Don’t you start.”

“Start what? I have nothing at all to say about a budding young Radiant being distracted from important events by romantic dalliances. Nothing at all.”

She halted at the window. “You’re getting better at sarcasm.”

“Thank you!” he replied. “Ahem. At least Renarin has only picked one person to be distracted by …”

Shallan rolled her eyes. In response, Pattern spun his pattern in a wild sequence, new lines and curves emerging in a transfixing flow. Well, storms. Now he was better at rolling his eyes than she was? Adolin had better not find out, or she’d never live it down.

Storms, Adolin.

These rooms reminded her of him—of practicing with the sword under his tutelage. Of his passion for the art, and his growing passion for her.

“Is there any way,” she said, “to know if he’s safe out there, Pattern? I’m worried about him, in Azimir.”

“I do not know,” Pattern said softly. “I’m sorry.”

It was silly to miss him already. She hadn’t even been in here … what? Half a day? He probably hadn’t seen battle yet. Still, she would have felt a lot better if he were here to hold.

She turned toward Pattern again. “It worries me how Mraize fooled us by taking Honor’s form. That could have easily gotten us killed. Plus, I’m concerned about what Iyatil is plotting.”

“Mmm … do you think she has a graph, or …”

“She might be letting Mraize distract us. If so, he does it well—and constantly outmaneuvers me.” She pulled out the anti-Stormlight knife. If she could get to their spren … It was awful to contemplate. And yet, they were enemy combatants.

She stalked back into the other room. “Have any of you seen Mraize’s spren when we interact?”

Rlain cocked his head. “Tumi says … he has had impressions of the spren watching from outside. But in here it’s hard to find someone who doesn’t want to be found. Particularly a spren.”

“They’ll be shy, like ours.”

Shallan gazed down at the dagger—which didn’t split into colors, like a lot of this vision. Instead it caused a little eddy around it, warping the air like a puncture in reality. A thought occurred to her. “Maybe I don’t have to hurt them—maybe I can use this on Mraize. I didn’t dare heal when I had anti-Light in my system. Mraize didn’t either, earlier. So I simply have to wound him badly enough that he can’t wait out the anti-Light evaporating from him.”

“Glys says that might work,” Renarin said, nodding. “If he pulls in Stormlight to heal, and it meets anti-Light … that will be deadly.”

She nodded firmly. “Unfortunately, Mraize is a better fighter than I am.”

“You did pretty well against him during the last fight, Shallan,” Rlain said with a praising rhythm.

“I did, but that fight could just as easily have gone the other way—and I was lucky to be able to fight him. If he’d managed to stab me in the back when I wasn’t looking, that could have been it. I wish we could get the drop on him for once.”

“How would we manage that?” Renarin asked.

“What if,” Rlain said, “instead of entering the visions directly, we sent in some kind of avatar—and we watched from outside?”

“Yes!” Shallan said. “Last time after leaving, I could kind of make out what was happening in the vision, and Lightweaving is ‘quiet.’ It won’t draw the attention of the gods that hunt your spren. We could watch the Ghostbloods, then strike when we have the upper hand.”

The two glanced at each other, and were probably communicating with their spren. Shallan glanced back toward Pattern, who had been joined by Testament—the other Cryptic had been lying on the overstuffed bed. Shallan remembered how lavish these quarters had felt when she’d first arrived.

She no longer saw such a bed as wasted on her. Relaxation was something she had earned, and she should enjoy it during the rare occasions when she wasn’t running into danger. It was all right for her to enjoy a little luxury in life. The same way it was all right for her to be happy with Adolin, and appreciate his love.

She really was feeling better. Except … on the writing desk by the doorway were a handful of spheres without gemstones. Ends, used for gambling for no stakes—or in this case, for learning sleight of hand. Tyn had given them to her. More by instinct than conscious thought, Shallan walked over and palmed several of the spheres, replacing them with ones from her pocket. Then she did it again, a quick move while bumping into the desk, or while raising her other hand as a distraction.

Pattern stepped over and put his long-fingered hand on her shoulder.

“Formless speaks of each person I’ve killed, people who took me in and trusted me,” Shallan whispered. “It feels … horrible when I see it in its whole context, Pattern. Mother, Father, Testament, Tyn … Next, Mraize. How many people who get close to me will I end up killing? Why does it happen so often to me?”

“I do not know, Shallan,” he whispered. “But as I have come to know humans better, I can tell you this: you are awful at statistics.”

“Is that supposed to be comforting?”

“Yes!” he said. “You are so deeply flawed in your understanding of numbers. It is in fact quite inspiring, yes.”

“I … need a little help, Pattern,” she said. “Understanding what in Damnation you’re talking about.”

“You are so bad at math!”

“Don’t say that, Pattern,” she replied. “My name, at least, is parallel. That’s a mathematical concept.”

“… Your name?”

“Yes.”

“Parallel?”

“Shallan,” she said. “Two ‘l’s. Pair’a’els.”

His pattern froze. Then, remarkably, he let out a loud guffaw. “That was actually funny!”

“Data point,” Renarin said from the couch. “No it was not. It really was not.”

“Ha ha!” Pattern said. “He is stupid. Listen, you are all stupid about numbers. You do well, for those with brains made of meat, but you think of everything wrong.” He pulled her from the room again and leaned closer. “Of all the people you’ve known, Shallan, how many have you killed? A few?”

“The important ones.”

“Adolin?” he asked. “Dalinar, Navani? The brothers you protected—and even if we are speaking solely of mentors, Sebarial and Palona still live despite their best efforts. And Jasnah. Hmmmm? You are not statistically dangerous to those around you. Only to those who try to kill you.”

“Testament,” she whispered.

“You are working to repair that error,” Pattern said. “Shallan, it is my job to help and protect you. I do a bad job sometimes! But today, let me promise: in you, I have found someone sincere. That is what attracted me—your sincerity and your lies, combining to create a more important truth.

“You will not hurt the people around you. Not intentionally, and not any more than any other human. The statistics Formless gives you are the bad kind of lies—the lies that look at a truth and twist it into something worse. I trust you. Testament trusts you, despite what happened. We love you. Statistically—real statistics—you have done an excellent job! I have ultimate, mathematically backed faith that you will continue to do an excellent job! So please, do not listen to Formless. Do not give her life.”

She put her hand on his, resting on her shoulder. “When did you get so good at talking to humans?”

“I listen to you,” Pattern said softly.

She smiled.

“Then I do the opposite,” he added.

He could only let that hang for a moment before snickering and whispering that it was a joke. Shallan smiled, then turned and walked into the sitting room with the men.

“Well?” she said.

“Glys says Rlain’s plan could work,” Renarin told her. “Next vision, we’ll avoid going in—and will instead send one of your Lightweavings while we watch.”