Rhythm of War (The Stormlight Archive #4) - Brandon Sanderson Page 0,543

He stepped toward it, but could see the Radiants in their lines on the floor, covered in sheets. Why weren’t they up and awake? Were they feigning? That could work, pretending they were still asleep.

Something dropped from above. A body hit the ground in front of Kaladin with a callous smack of skull on stone. It rolled, and Kaladin saw burned-out eyes. A terribly familiar bearded face. A face that had smiled at him countless times, cursed at him an equal number, but had always been there when everything else went dark.

Teft.

Teft was dead.

* * *

Moash landed a short distance from where Kaladin knelt over Teft’s body. Several of the watching soldiers stepped toward the Windrunner, but Moash raised his hand and stopped them.

“No,” he said softly as Heavenly Ones hovered down around him. “Leave him be. This is how we win.”

Moash knew exactly what Kaladin was feeling. That crushing sense of despair, that knowledge that nothing would be the same. Nothing could ever be the same. Light had left the world, and could never be rekindled.

Kaladin cradled Teft’s corpse, letting out a low, piteous whine. He began to tremble and shake—becoming as insensate as he had when King Elhokar had died. As he had after Moash had killed Roshone. And if Kaladin responded that way to the deaths of his enemies …

Well, Teft dying would be worse. Far, far worse. Kaladin had been unraveling for years.

“That,” Moash said to the Fused, “is how you break a storm. He’ll be useless from here on out. Make sure nobody touches him. I have something to do.”

He walked into the infirmary room. At the rear was the model of the tower, intricate in its detail, cut into a cross section with one half on either side. He knelt and peered at a copy of the room with the crystal pillar.

Beside it, produced in miniature, were a small crystal globe and gemstone. The fabrial glowed with a tiny light, barely visible. The final node of the tower’s defenses, placed where anyone who looked would see it, but think nothing of it.

Raboniel had known though. How long? He suspected she’d figured it out days ago, and was stalling to continue her research here. That one was trouble. He summoned his Blade and used the tip to destroy the tiny fabrial.

Then he walked over to the sectioned-off portion of the room. The child Edgedancer lay here, tied up and unconscious, next to Kaladin’s parents and brother. Odium was interested in the Edgedancer, and Moash had been forbidden to kill her. Hopefully he hadn’t struck her head too hard. He didn’t always control that as he should.

For now, he grabbed Lirin by his bound hands and dragged him—screaming through his gag—out of the infirmary. There Moash waited until the Pursuer came flying back as a shameful ribbon of light.

The Pursuer formed a body, and Moash pushed Lirin into the creature’s hands. “This is Stormblessed’s father,” Moash whispered. “No! Don’t say it loudly. Don’t draw Kaladin’s attention. His father is insurance; Kaladin has huge issues with the man. If Kaladin somehow regains his senses, immediately kill his father in front of him.”

“This is nonsense,” the Pursuer growled. “I could kill Stormblessed now.”

“No,” Moash said, grabbing the Pursuer and pointing at his face. “You know I have our master’s blessing. You know I speak to Command. You will not touch Stormblessed. You can’t hurt him; you can’t kill him.”

“He’s … just a man.…”

“Don’t touch him,” Moash said. “If you interfere, it will awaken him to vengeance. We don’t want that yet. There are two paths open to him. One is to take the route I did, and give up his pain. The other is the route he should have taken long ago. The path where he raises the only hand that can kill Kaladin Stormblessed. His own.”

The Pursuer didn’t like it, judging by the rhythm he hummed. But he accepted Kaladin’s bound and gagged father and seemed willing to stay put.

The guards had quieted the rowdy humans, and the atrium was falling still. Kaladin knelt before the storm, clinging to a dead man, shaking. Moash hesitated, searching inside himself. And … he felt nothing. Just coldness.

Good. He had reached his potential.

“Don’t ruin this,” he told the gathered Fused. “I need to go kill a queen.”

* * *

Navani waited for her chance.

She had tried talking to the Sibling, but had heard only whimpers. So she had returned to the front of her room to wait for her chance to