Chapter 76

Jasnah’s argument is probably the greatest a person could make against what I teach, and so it must be addressed. I am not certain I have the philosophy, the words, or the experience to do so with the respect it deserves.

—From the epilogue to Oathbringer, by Dalinar Kholin

S hallan appeared in a dying body.

She gasped at the sudden pain, putting a hand to her side and feeling blood as she lay on the Shin grass, the sun blazing overhead. Storms. She was in the body of a mortally wounded singer. That made her panic before she felt something in her mind …

Mmm … Shallan?

“Pattern? You’re in my mind. Like when you’re a sword.”

Our bond has been strengthening. You have said the proper truths. We thought maybe this would start to work. You looked afraid.

“I’m in a dying body!”

Glys says he’s sorry—he can’t always pick the bodies. He wanted to get you into a singer so that you’d be able to understand Mishram, but … well …

“It’s all right,” Shallan whispered. “Maybe we should try again? Pull me out? Or maybe I’ll just heal—”

Mmm … Pattern said. A singer using Stormlight would draw attention from anyone watching. Glys wants you to avoid that. He says you won’t really die, because you’re not really wounded, but … I’ll tell him to pull you out anyway.

“Thank you,” Shallan said, squeezing her eyes closed against the pain, one hand on the wound—the broken carapace felt odd beneath her fingers.

Wait. Shallan, look.

She frowned and raised her head, though that made her vision swim. She was lying among a large group of corpses and the mortally wounded, the battle having moved on. Some bodies bled red, others orange, and a mess of spren—fearspren, angerspren, confusionspren, painspren—sprinkled the ground and air, to her singer body’s eyes looking closer to their forms in Shadesmar than the way humans saw them. Some ten feet away, a singer wept and clutched at the wounds along her side, humming in fits and spurts. A song perhaps, to comfort herself as she died.

Ba-Ado-Mishram was approaching. The Unmade took the shape of a black mass of smoke, with hands growing out of it to move. Powerful hands, entirely black, stretching out and gripping the ground to pull her along.

Leave me here for now, Shallan thought to Pattern, gritting her teeth.

When Mishram reached the other dying singer, her strange too-long limbs puffed away into smoke, but the main mass of blackness remained. That transformed into a singer femalen as if she were emerging from fog, with billowing robes and long black hair. She leaned down over the dying soldier, and extra arms formed to cradle the head and body.

They exchanged words, too soft for Shallan to hear. She forced herself to wait, but couldn’t help whimpering at the pain.

Mishram turned toward her. Shallan’s heart stumbled. That was the face she’d seen in her drawings—in the sky, the smoke, the knots and grain of wood. Unlike Sja-anat, who tended to appear human—or as perhaps some kind of spren, with smooth skin and too-narrow features—Mishram was unabashedly singer. Some red lines of smoke made up her face, giving her an otherworldly carapace and patterns.

She fixated on Shallan, then again became a cloud of smoke with stretching arms. She pulled herself with that same unnatural gait up to Shallan, and became a singer again.

Storms.

Should we bring you out? Pattern asked.

Shallan waited, her breath held, as Mishram loomed over her, arms forming from amorphous smoke at her sides to cradle Shallan. The Unmade leaned down, then breathed out, darkness wrapping around Shallan. Storms, it was … it was …

“ Live, ” Mishram whispered, her voice somehow overlapping with a dozen different rhythms. “ Heal. ”

The pain in her side vanished, and her body reknit. Nearby, she could see the other singer stumbling to her feet, humming in amazement at her restored body. They weren’t Regals with powers, let alone Fused. They were common soldiers.

“Why?” Shallan asked as Mishram gently lowered her to the ground.

“He does not love us,” Mishram said. She looked to the sky, as if worried. “So we must love ourselves.” She became smoke again, long arms stretching across the battlefield as she looked for other wounded singers.

Shallan struggled to her feet. She’s healing people, she thought to Pattern. Did any of you expect that?

I try not to expect things that aren’t mathematically sure, Pattern said . People say that life tends to be irrational, but even irrational numbers can be computed with ease. You all are something beyond that.

Storms. More than irrational?

Way more. Regardless, the others are fascinated by this. Rlain says that Mishram was one of the main gods they rejected in leaving—so he didn’t expect kindness from her. They want you to see if you can get any more information.

Shallan picked her way across the field to where Mishram healed another near-dead singer. The malen put his hand to his head, where his carapace had been cracked.

“The other Unmade have plots,” Shallan said. “What are yours?”

“You deserve,” she said—again with too many rhythms, “far better than him. Live. Feel. Feel so much more than he allows. Be. ” She turned away, long arms quickly pulling her toward another fallen body.

Shallan looked to the other two who had been healed. They gathered with her, watching Mishram.

“I never know what to make of them,” the femalen said.

“I saw Yelig-nar consume a dozen of our kind in one battle,” the malen whispered to a morose rhythm. “My brother included. Now this one … heals us? They’re spren. Best not to try to understand them.”

“She’s right though,” Shallan found herself saying. “Odium doesn’t care about us.”

“He cares about winning,” the femalen said. “If we want to live in peace, we’ll need to kill the humans. It’s that or be destroyed.”

“We could coexist,” Shallan said.

Both hummed to the same rhythm, which seemed mocking or skeptical. Storms, it was easier to pick those out in a singer body, wasn’t it?

“Coexisting,” the malen said. “A fanciful dream. Sure, who wouldn’t prefer that?”

“The humans slaughtered my sisters,” the femalen said. “It can’t happen. I won’t let it.”

Shallan crossed the field, and the other two didn’t stop or question her. The singers didn’t maintain the same kind of discipline or expectations as human societies. Not that they were without conviction or prowess—but they didn’t have the same hierarchies of commanders or ranks.

She approached Mishram, the grass ignoring her as she stepped on it. Strangely, she realized that if she were to live in one of these two militaries, she’d probably prefer to be in the singer one. There was a sense of freedom and individuality to their lives—something she’d never really noticed before watching them closely in these visions.

All this time she’d imagined them as destroyers, seeking to enslave humankind. But humans were the ones who made slaves. Then again, from what she’d seen, humans had grander cities, more diversity of professions, and—strangely—more artists. Why should that be? Considering how free they were, shouldn’t there be more artists among singers? Perhaps for art to truly flourish, you needed certain kinds of infrastructure. A part of her hated that idea, realistic though it sounded, and …

And she let Radiant take control. Mishram had found a human this time, still alive, blood on his lips as he lay there trembling, eyes squeezed shut against the monstrosity that loomed above him. He was muttering something, but Shallan—in the singer’s body—couldn’t understand it. The words felt so dead to her without a rhythm.

“Will you heal him?” she asked.

“I cannot,” the Unmade said. “And I would not.” She hesitated. “Yet we should sing for him. That will make his final transition more peaceful.”

Mishram leaned down and began to sing softly to the Rhythm of Peace. Shallan’s anxiety lessened. The dying man stopped trembling, and his breathing became more regular. He even … even seemed to hum to it himself until he slipped away.

Shallan found tears in her eyes, and Mishram regarded her—strangely, the spren didn’t turn so much as just shift until she was facing a different direction.

“You cry for them, singer?” Mishram asked.

“I cry for all of us,” Shallan whispered. “And for the pain that we all cause one another. Is there no way to stop this, Mishram?”

“He will never allow it, for the wars serve him, preparing his armies for a future I do not yet understand. We must dominate the humans. That is first. They will not stop fighting until we are completely under their control, so we must accomplish that first.” She hesitated. “Then, perhaps.” The spren looked to the sky. “If he allows it … I wish that he would.”

Storms. Shallan had grown to know, in a small way, Sja-anat—and had briefly been forced to trust the spren. Yet in all her interactions with the Unmade, she had never seen one act so very human as Mishram did now, humming softly for a dying enemy. Shallan reminded herself that Mishram would eventually pick up the war against humankind in Odium’s absence. She and Mishram were on opposite sides of this battlefield, but—

Mishram’s song changed.

Shallan stepped back in shock as the smoky figure began to vibrate and pulse, her face distorting. “I see you,” it hissed. “I see you, Lightweaver.”

Shallan felt a jolt of panic. That angry, twisted face. It wasn’t the Ba-Ado-Mishram of memory. It was the current one.

“I will rip you to pieces,” Mishram said, advancing on her. “I will pull your bones from their sockets and listen to them pop. I will crack your fingers backward, just to hear you scream. I will revel in the things that flow from you when sliced: pain and screams and bowels unchained. I—”

We’re getting you out, Pattern said.

Shallan was glad for that, but as it happened, she realized this was the most interaction she’d had with Mishram. This was progress, terrifying though it was—so she tried a Lightweaving as she was yanked free. She’d planned it, and she thought it might—

She shook, finding herself on the scaffolding again. She scrambled up, ignoring questions from Pattern and Rlain—instead peering at the vision. She’d managed to create a Lightweaving of herself, as Shallan, that had appeared beside the soldier whose body she’d been inhabiting. The soldier wandered off, heading toward the other two who had been healed, to continue on as the historical event had played out.

The fake Shallan stayed in place, and she—outside—controlled it. “Why?” she whispered, making the Lightweaving say the same. With her eyes closed, she was almost back inside. She couldn’t hear Mishram’s reply from out here, but Glys glided up to her and whispered what the Unmade said.

“Why what?” Mishram replied. “Why do I hate you?”

“No,” Shallan said. “We came to your world, and then fought you for it. We imprisoned you for thousands of years. I know why you hate me.”

“Then what?” Mishram said, Glys imitating her biting anger.

“Why is Odium afraid of you?” Shallan said. “Could you actually replace him?”

Stillness.

Then Glys gasped.

Shallan trembled as she opened her eyes and found the swirling smoke-paint of the Spiritual Realm all around her, shifting behind her, flowing like a thousand rivers smashing together. The eddies of their motion formed faces, which all moved in unison.

“How do you know?” Mishram demanded. “ How do you know? ”

“I’ve been there,” Shallan whispered. “I killed those who created me as well.”

Mishram’s essence flowed forward, colorful mist becoming darkness, becoming hands that reached for Shallan. Whatever the nature of Mishram’s prison, it was weaker in here. Shallan was sure those hands had become real, and would—

Rlain stepped between them.

Tall as a tower, with the armor of a singer and the uniform of an Alethi. His spren joined him, faceless, hiding in his shadow. A second later, Renarin stepped up as well.

Mishram froze, eddies of paint-smoke swirling around her, other faces vanishing into it until just one remained. Staring at them. Staring at …

Shallan had made a practice of studying eyelines for sketching. She was absolutely certain that Mishram was staring at the way Renarin had taken Rlain’s hand for support.

“We are children of Sja-anat,” Glys said from behind Renarin. “You remember your sister?”

“Help us find you,” Rlain demanded. “We cannot free you, but it will be better for everyone if you are found by us, and not by our enemies.”

Shallan’s breath caught. Yes, despite Renarin’s complaints, she did want to find the prison. If Mishram could actually threaten Odium … well, that was a weapon worth having. And having Rlain agree with her was bolstering.

Mishram faded back into the swirling paint-smoke and vanished.

Shallan groaned and climbed to her feet. Then she noticed Pattern humming nearby. He pointed back into the vision—which was still playing out. Testament stepped up beside Pattern, both of them looking at Shallan’s Lightweaving through a clearer section of the glass.

Shallan’s illusions no longer froze when she wasn’t directing them. The one inside, for example, had clasped its hands and was staring thoughtfully, shifting occasionally as a living person might. Pattern pointed toward the shadow of a nearby hillside, where someone was peeking out and inspecting Shallan’s illusion from behind. A human soldier who gripped a dagger that warped the air.

Mraize. Shallan’s breath caught. He watched the illusory her, obviously prepared to run up and strike … but he hesitated. She was absolutely certain he hesitated. She didn’t get to see for how long, as the vision soon ended, and the glass pillar crumpled away.

Then strangely, the ground beneath her feet darkened. Shallan took hold of Renarin so the three of them would be less likely to be separated. “What is that darkness?” she hissed.

“It’s him, ” Glys said. “Mishram seeing us has led Odium to notice something was wrong. He’s searching for us.”

“We will hide,” Tumi said. “Take care, Shallan. We will find you soon.”

“But—”

“We will find you,” Tumi repeated.

She was cast into the shifting chaos.

Alone.

Adolin sat, left hand against his chin, staring at the complicated towers board. They’d swapped to smaller cards to fit more on a table—each barely an inch.

Two practice swords were on the floor, and Yanagawn was still sweating from their sparring match. No Shardplate today—just good old-fashioned swordplay. Each time Adolin arrived, the Imperial Guards changed to ones led by Gezamal, Kushkam’s son. A great number of the standard guards would have serious trouble with Adolin embarrassing their emperor during training. Thus, before his sessions, Kushkam switched them out.

That workout was finished, so now, as the welcome cool breeze of the evening darkness arrived—allowed in through the far side of the tent—it was time for the more important lesson of the evening. One in tactics.

“Hmm …” Yanagawn said, surveying the board, letting out a concentrationspren—like a water drop rippling the air behind him in circles. “I’m doomed.”

“Are you?” Adolin asked.

“You’ve proven to me, time and time again, that the larger force wins. Not just by a linear amount either.”

“Explain.”

Yanagawn eyed him, then pointed at the board. “I currently have a hundred thousand troops. You have a hundred and twenty thousand.”

“But you started with more.”

“You always let me start at the advantage.”

“So the larger force doesn’t always win?”

“I should say,” Yanagawn replied, “that all other factors being equal—including the skill of their leader—the larger force wins. Is that correct?”

“And not just by a linear amount,” Adolin said. “That’s relevant.”

The emperor nodded, in his training robe looking like an ordinary youth. His black hair was six inches long; when not trapped under extravagant headgear it could flare outward in that uniquely Makabaki way.

“Two equal forces smashing against one another,” Yanagawn said softly, “will both suffer huge casualties. But if one force is even ten or twenty percent larger, something strange happens. The casualties on the other side multiply. Two hundred against one hundred doesn’t result in one hundred dead on each side—it results in a hundred dead on the smaller side, and maybe only twenty dead on the larger side. The more overwhelming your force, the more protected each man is.”

“Assuming,” Adolin said, “both forces fight until one is utterly annihilated—which is extremely rare. Armies will usually break after ten to fifteen percent losses. That’s not cowardice; it’s human nature.” He leaned forward. “A good general understands the stakes. Almost nothing is worth fighting for until you’re all dead.”

“So I should retreat on this board,” Yanagawn said. “You have an overwhelming size advantage, so I’ll lose.”

“Will you, though?” Adolin asked.

To his credit, Yanagawn didn’t get exasperated by Adolin’s pushing. He studied further, taking his time.

Gezamal, wearing his Imperial Guard uniform with the extra patterns, had moved over so he could view the board. The man was an expert towers player; he would immediately see what Adolin was teaching. Yanagawn, however, needed a hint.

“Look for your troops,” Adolin said, “who have an advantage.”

“These here,” Yanagawn said, pointing to a line of troops at the front of his formation. “They have an advantage still. Representing, I believe, high ground.”

“And what is high ground?”

“A force multiplier,” Yanagawn said. “These spearmen, particularly fighting defensively, can hold against a larger force. But Adolin, this is only a small portion of my army; you think I should keep them here so the others can retreat?”

Adolin waited, saying nothing.

“… No,” Yanagawn said softly, then made his move. Redeploying the troops with an advantage to defensive postures, turning their cards around. He’d seen. Adolin’s troops were split between those on the field and a smaller force of reserves coming in from behind. Yanagawn’s troops, in turn, were split between the small portion on the hilltop and the larger portion within striking distance of Adolin’s reserves.

Over the next few moves, Yanagawn positioned his larger force against Adolin’s reserves—counting on his hilltop defensive troops to hold back the rest for a time, as they couldn’t pass without taking huge losses. They held long enough for the bulk of his troops to surround and begin destroying Adolin’s reserves—which Adolin had deliberately left exposed for the lesson.

“I see …” Yanagawn said. “I thought it was my one hundred against your one twenty. But with this maneuver, I leave twenty of mine to hold back the bulk of yours—while my eighty destroy your arriving forty.”

“You’d take some casualties among your defensive troops,” Adolin said, “but in the end, I’d be left with the smaller overall army. Now I, seeing that, am the one who has to withdraw.”

“I’ve been told, Adolin,” Gezamal said, squatting down by the table, “that you can turn almost any position into a winning one. These scenarios happen in real life—not as clearly, not as cleanly, but they are real. I’ve read of them.”

“I’ve lived them,” Adolin said. “It works—separate enemy forces, gang up on the smaller one … It’s a good tactic, and one every military commander should know. Watch for chances to turn the battle in your favor, Yanagawn. Because almost any fight can be won.”

He began gathering the cards.

“Is that applicable to our own circumstances?” Yanagawn said, looking toward the side of the tent—toward the dome. They could faintly hear fighting inside, though the hour was growing late. Adolin had spent hours in there today; as the enemy troops grew more confident with their position, they now kept almost constant pressure against the defenders.

“Yes,” Adolin said. “We can win this, Yanagawn.”

“Our troops are exhausted,” Yanagawn said.

“Fresh ones should arrive within the day,” Adolin replied. “Plus, we’re in an advantageous spot. You can’t always see your whole battlefield like we can here in the dome—and you can rarely manage it so well. Towers is an excellent training method, but it’s a little too formal, a little too structured.”

“I’ve heard my father say the same, Adolin,” Gezamal said. “On a real battlefield, troops get bogged down, or maneuver wrong, or orders arrive after the situation has changed.” He paused. “I think I’d struggle with true battlefield strategy—I’m too used to having exacting control over my pieces.”

“I’m sure you’d do better than you think,” Yanagawn said.

“Thank you,” Gezamal replied. Then he stiffened, his eyes going wide, drawing a shockspren. He’d been spoken to directly by the emperor, and had replied. He stood up straight, and grew very quiet. It wasn’t wrong to address the emperor if spoken to, but it was a breach—it seemed—for such an exchange to happen with a guard.

“It’s all right,” Adolin said to Gezamal. “We’re all friends in this tent.”

“No, it’s not,” Gezamal said, very stiff-backed.

Adolin sighed, but he didn’t push. He expected other military leaders to put up with the way he led his troops—he should probably try a little harder to appreciate the Azish system.

“Adolin,” Yanagawn said, leaning forward to help gather the cards. “You always give me the advantage at the start of a game. I wonder if we should try it another way. My uncle, when I was … living my previous life … always said hardship made a man grow. If I start in a winning position, how will I learn?”

“We’ll move on to other training structures eventually,” Adolin promised. “But Yanagawn, let me share something my father once told me. He said that if he had ten generals who could always win from a superior position, he could rule the world. Do not discount how difficult it is to maintain a lead. Too many generals throw away winning positions because of bad fundamentals.”

“All right,” he said.

“You talked earlier about the stronger force always winning, but we just proved that’s not the case. Indeed, there’s an old list we call Valithar’s Dictates. He said there are three primary ways that a general loses from a numerical advantage. Can you name any of them?”

“Terrain?” Yanagawn guessed. “An inferior force with better fortifications can beat a superior force. In today’s game, I was able to use the land against you.”

“Excellent,” Adolin said.

“A second one …” Yanagawn said, “involves leadership or training? I lost early games because I was incompetent.”

“One general doesn’t have to be incompetent to lose to another that is better, but yes, that is one of the three. Superior troops or leadership can change a losing position into a winning one. And the third?”

Yanagawn thought awhile, then shook his head.

“Random chance,” Adolin said. “A strong line can buckle because a single soldier loses his footing. A powerful force can have its supply lines swept away by unexpected flooding, leaving its soldiers hungry and at a disadvantage.”

“Frustrating,” Yanagawn said.

“Life,” Adolin replied. Then he paused. “Technically, there is a fourth way a stronger force frequently loses to a weaker one, though it’s not one Valithar outlined. We’ll talk about that later. For now, focus on these three.”

“I will,” Yanagawn promised. Then he hesitated. “Adolin?”

“Yes?”

“Will I ever be able to use any of this?” The emperor sat back in his cushioned seat on the floor before their low table. A servant brought wine, delivering it to another servant, who poured it, and in turn gave it to the servant who today was designated as worthy to present it to the emperor.

“Depends,” Adolin said, pouring himself some wine—orange, because his father had gotten to him—and lying back on his own cushions. “We hope to never have to use this in real life. War finds us nonetheless.”

“Your father is building us a lasting peace,” Yanagawn said. “If we hold here until the deadline arrives, then Azir is free. But either way, the war with the singers ends. Doesn’t it?”

“That’s how it appears,” Adolin said.

“So when will I use any of this?”

“Well,” Adolin said, “there’s the joy of the game. Have you enjoyed learning towers?”

“Immensely.”

“Then you can keep playing,” Adolin said, sipping his wine. He gazed upward, thoughtful, imagining the sky past the tent’s top. “What do you make of what the contract implies? About … war out there?”

“Other worlds?” Yanagawn said. “We have legends about them, in our records. We record everything, and there are so many stories that confirm this if you look for them.”

“Really?” Adolin said, perking up.

“Firsthand accounts of people who traveled here,” Yanagawn said, “traversing a great darkness that sounds an awful lot like Shadesmar. I had my scribes gather them all, and the weight of them together … it’s rather convincing. We all thought so, right, Noura?” He turned, but she wasn’t there. She still left during the training. “Anyway,” Yanagawn continued, “seeing it all together, it’s remarkable we didn’t understand this earlier. Makes me wonder if anyone close to us is secretly one of them. A person from another world.”

“His name is Wit,” Adolin said. “And he’s kind of a jerk.”

Yanagawn smiled. “We have legends about him too. Most records call him an emissary of Yaezir, but it’s clear he’s been interfering for millennia.” He paused, looking down at his wine. “Wit, our emissary of the gods, is just … a man. I spoke to him only last week. We worship Yaezir—or as you call him, Jezerezeh—yet it seems he never was God … and that he might be dead anyway.”

“Yeah,” Adolin said. “I … do think about that.”

“What does it mean?” Yanagawn asked. “What do you believe, in the face of all of this?”

What did he believe? Storms, that was a good question. How long had it been since he’d paid for prayers, gone to the devotary, or done any of the other things he was supposed to do? One would think that with literal Voidbringers coming down to assault the land, he’d be more devout, not less. But then his father had gone and upended religion itself and … and Adolin was left wondering. If there were gods, or an Almighty, or something … shouldn’t Adolin be getting a little help now and then? He was trying to protect the world.

Those kinds of worries unnerved him on a fundamental level. As he considered, he felt something from Maya—distant though she was. A kind of comfort.

They continued playing, and some servants brought Yanagawn food—letting him take a short break to dine. Not a formal dinner, just some snacks.

“Silver plates?” Adolin asked with a smile. “And forks?”

“Worse, or better,” Yanagawn said, raising a small fork he was using with one hand. A servant took it, stabbed a small fruit, then handed it back. “Aluminum.”

“Aluminum?” Adolin said. “You have aluminum dining ware?”

“And finery,” Yanagawn said, gesturing to some of the nearby candelabras holding ceremonial candles. “This one here was made from a star that fell during my predecessor’s days—we used to call it starmetal. More valuable than any gemstone or other metal. Only the finest for the emperor.”

“We could use that,” Adolin said, thoughtful. “It blocks Shardblades, and has other applications.”

Yanagawn paused. “I hadn’t really thought about that. Maybe I should have—especially when they started coating my bedrooms in plates of it to protect from the Fused.” He turned from his meal and gave instructions for people to begin gathering the metal to take to the armorers. The enemy hadn’t used any Shardblades in this fight, but who knew? A few shields banded in the stuff might be useful.

Adolin was thinking on this as his guards swapped. He wasn’t surprised when Hmask—happy and smiling—was in the new rotation.

“Good to see you, my friend,” Adolin said to him.

Hmask merely nodded.

“Wish I knew what your story was,” Adolin said idly.

Yanagawn, accepting another drink, looked over. Then he spoke to Hmask directly—his guards and aides were slowly getting used to this—in what sounded like perfect Thaylen.

Hmask, surprised, replied. He spoke quickly and eagerly.

“Interesting,” Yanagawn said in Azish. “Adolin, do you remember a moment during the Battle of Thaylen Field when you were in a building and a large monster was attacking it?”

“Thunderclast,” Adolin said. “Yeah. I wasn’t able to beat it. Honestly, I barely inconvenienced it.” He thought back to that whole ordeal with shame at his failure.

Hmask kept talking.

“There was a boy,” Yanagawn said, “in a building that was breaking and crumbling. Do you remember?”

Adolin paused, picturing it.

A whimper. An overturned table. Thunderclast footfalls, shaking chips from the ceiling. A young boy.

“I remember,” Adolin said, and Yanagawn interpreted.

Hmask knelt, mustaches and eyebrows wagging, and took Adolin’s hand. “Son,” he said in Alethi. “Me. Son. You.” He pressed his forehead to Adolin’s hand. “Me. Son. You. ”

“I think,” Yanagawn said, “you saved his son’s life.”

Hmask stood up, tears in his eyes, and slapped his chest. He then returned to his stance by the exit. Until now, Adolin had forgotten that moment in Thaylen City. Storms.

Before he could think further though, a pair of Azish scribes arrived in a flurry. Adolin sat up, alarmed. These were dressed as Azish information gatherers. He was pretty sure they ran the local spanreed hub for the emperor.

They weren’t looking for him, however. They asked for Noura, then left when she wasn’t there.

“What was that?” Adolin said.

“Hmm?” Yanagawn said. “They would have said something if it was important.”

Adolin excused himself, pushing out into the night. He spotted the two moving to another lit tent and tried to follow them in, but was stopped by guards.

He gritted his teeth until Noura called from within. “He may enter.”

Adolin pushed past the men and found her at a desk with several other viziers. The two scribes he’d seen earlier stood there, swarming with anxietyspren like twisting black crosses. They’d delivered spanreed writings to Noura.

“What kind of important news,” he said, “causes the lead scribes of the spanreed hub to run to you personally?”

Noura looked to him, then drew her lips to a line. Somehow Adolin knew—from that grim expression—that this wasn’t information from Urithiru about the war effort at large; it was specific to Azir.

“The reinforcements,” he guessed. “They aren’t going to arrive in time.”

“You,” Noura said, “are smarter than your reputation suggests, Highprince.”

His stomach sank. Even though he’d planned for this, expected it for days … well, you anticipated the worst case, but you did not want to have to encounter it.

“What happened?” he demanded.

“Betrayal,” she said. “Emul and Tashikk have turned on us.”

Emul and Tashikk? Two of the subject nations in the Azish empire. The coalition had expended huge efforts to protect Emul from conquest recently. That was why the bulk of their armies were away, needing to march to Azimir.

“The phantom force that struck at our reinforcement,” he said. “They were our own people.”

“Supposedly our own,” Noura said. Nearby a spanreed was writing furiously. Adolin waited as she read it, then met his eyes. “From the prime of Emul. A formal declaration of secession. It seems … they’ve made their own deal with Odium. I suspect we’ll get the same from Tashikk.”

The dagger of those words cut deeply, and Adolin attracted a spren he never had before—in all his years. Like snapping strings expanding from him. Betrayalspren.

The scribes outlined it for him. Though the bulk of the forty thousand troops marching to their rescue were Alethi and Azish, the entire remaining force from the two subject nations had turned against them—and were harrying them, slowing them. It would be enough to keep the army from arriving in time.

“Storms,” he whispered. “How could they? Why?”

“Evidently,” Noura said, reading a letter from the Tashikki prime, “Odium offered them a deal with some small measure of autonomy—and they decided to take that instead of waiting on the results of the battle here. I fear … they assumed that if Azir won, it would reinforce our imperial claim, and that we might push for stronger oversight and taxation. They saw themselves as picking between two bad choices, and took the sure one.”

Adolin sat there, his stomach churning, his nerves taut as he tried to find a way out of this mess. He’d never expected their allies—those they’d fought to protect—to turn on them. It meant … storms, this was a brilliant move on Odium’s part. He’d known the Azish empire was only tenuously united, and had struck precisely in a way to give the smaller parties some concessions so he could dominate the larger one.

“The enemy is isolating us, Noura,” he said. “He’s looking to suffocate us.”

He felt the winds behind him grow still, and he could make out the shouts of men fighting in the dome. Men who were exhausted, barely holding on.

Men who would have to hold out for three and a half more days.

Because no help was coming.