Rhythm of War (The Stormlight Archive #4) - Brandon Sanderson Page 0,73

“Our ultimate goal is to find a place where we can escape other people’s rules and their laws. A place where we can be what we wish and cast off the roles forced upon us.”

“I’m in,” Shumin said. “That sounds like a storming delight, Brightness. Maybe … maybe if we have forms of power that aren’t granted by Odium, the enemy will leave us alone.”

Either that or Odium would see that his minions scoured Venli and her faction from the planet.

Timbre pulsed, saying no great work could be accomplished without risk. Venli hated when she said things like that. It reminded her exactly how dangerous her current actions were. She drew in a little Light to check Shadesmar again. She saw nothing spying on her, so—

A dark, pulsing flame was moving down from above.

Leshwi.

Venli leaped to her feet, her chair slamming to the ground. Dul and Mazish noticed her urgency and stood upright, searching around, trying to decide what to do.

“Open the shades!” Venli said. “Quickly! So she doesn’t see anything odd!”

They slammed the windows open right as the hatch rattled. Lady Leshwi—brilliant in her outfit of gold and black—entered, skimming above the steps. She almost never came down here. What was going on?

Timbre trembled inside Venli. They’d been discovered. It had to mean they’d—

“Gather yourself, Last Listener,” Leshwi said to the Rhythm of Agony. “Something is happening. Something dangerous. I fear the war is about to take a distinctly different turn.”

One of my pleas is for artifabrians to stop shrouding fabrial techniques with so much mystery. Many decoy metals are used in cages, and wires are often plated to look like a different metal, with the express intent of confusing those who might try to learn the process through personal study. This might enrich the artifabrian, but it impoverishes us all.

—Lecture on fabrial mechanics presented by Navani Kholin to the coalition of monarchs, Urithiru, Jesevan, 1175

As they arrived at Urithiru, Kaladin wanted nothing more than to vanish. To go someplace where he wouldn’t have to listen to everyone laughing. There were a hundred of them together, mostly squires of the various Windrunners who had once been his team.

Kaladin didn’t have many squires left—none, unless you counted Dabbid and Rlain. Rock didn’t have a spren either, but he … had moved on to something else. Kaladin wasn’t sure what it was, but he didn’t call himself a squire.

Rlain would soon have a spren, and would finally be able to move on too. Dabbid had gone on the mission today to help Renarin deliver water and supplies to the townspeople. He’d never recovered from his battle shock, however, and didn’t have Radiant powers. He wasn’t so much a squire as someone Kaladin and the others looked after.

The rest had all ascended to at least the Second Ideal. That made them more than a squire, but not yet a full Radiant—having bonded a spren, but not yet having earned a Blade. They were all so jovial as they walked together across the Oathgate plateau, and Kaladin didn’t begrudge them their mirth. They were dear to him, and he wanted them to laugh.

Yet at the moment, he couldn’t imagine anything more painful than the way they all tried to cheer him up. They sensed his mood, though he hadn’t spoken to them regarding his … relegation? His retirement?

Storms. It made him sick to think about it.

As they walked, Lopen told him a particularly bad joke. Skar asked him for a sparring session—which was his way of offering help. Normally Kaladin would have agreed. But today … sparring would remind him of what he’d lost.

Sigzil, showing admirable restraint, told him that battle reports could wait until tomorrow. Storms. How bad did he look? Kaladin did his best to deflect them all, pasting on a smile so wide it felt like it cracked his skin.

Rock kept his distance, carefully ignoring Kaladin. Rock generally did have a better sense of his true mood than most. And Rock could see Syl, who—fretful as she buzzed around Kaladin—eventually zipped off. She caught a current nearby, flying into the air. She found flight as reassuring as he did.

I need to be careful not to let this break her, he thought. Keep up a strong front for her, for all of them. They shouldn’t have to be in pain because of how I feel. He could do this gracefully. He could fight this one last battle.

They crossed the open field of stone before the tower city. Kaladin almost managed to