scarred and dark of expression. Why, Dalinar thought, do I trust this man so much? He couldn’t put his finger on it, but over the years, he’d learned to trust his instincts as a soldier and a general. Something within him urged him to trust Kaladin, and he accepted those instincts.
“This is a small matter,” Dalinar said.
Kaladin looked at him sharply.
“Don’t worry yourself overly much about how the person got in to scribble on my wall,” Dalinar said. “Just be more watchful in the future. Dismissed.” He nodded to Kaladin, who retreated reluctantly, pulling the door closed.
Adolin walked over. The mop-haired youth was as tall as Dalinar was. That was hard to remember, sometimes. It didn’t seem so long ago that Adolin had been an eager little boy with a wooden sword.
“You said you awoke to this here,” Navani said. “You said you didn’t see anyone enter or hear anyone make the drawing.”
Dalinar nodded.
“Then why,” she said, “do I get the sudden and distinct impression that you know why it is here?”
“I don’t know for certain who made it, but I know what it means.”
“What, then?” Navani demanded.
“It means we have very little time left,” Dalinar said. “Send out the proclamation, then go to the highprinces and arrange a meeting. They’ll want to speak with me.”
The Everstorm comes. . . .
Sixty-two days. Not enough time.
It was, apparently, all he had.
The sign on the wall proposed a greater danger, even, than its deadline. To foresee the future is of the Voidbringers.
—From the journal of Navani Kholin, Jeseses 1174
“Toward victory and, at long last, vengeance.” The crier carried a writ with the king’s words on it—bound between two cloth-covered boards—though she obviously had the words memorized. Not surprising. Kaladin alone had made her repeat the proclamation three times.
“Again,” he said, sitting on his stone beside Bridge Four’s firepit. Many members of the crew had lowered their breakfast bowls, going silent. Nearby, Sigzil repeated the words to himself, memorizing them.
The crier sighed. She was a plump, lighteyed young woman with strands of red hair mixed in her black, bespeaking Veden or Horneater heritage. There would be dozens of women like her moving through the warcamp to read, and sometimes explain, Dalinar’s words.
She opened the ledger again. In any other battalion, Kaladin thought idly, its leader would be of a high enough social class to outrank her.
“Under the authority of the king,” she said, “Dalinar Kholin, Highprince of War, hereby orders changes to the manner of collection and distribution of gemhearts on the Shattered Plains. Henceforth, each gemheart will be collected in turn by two highprinces working in tandem. The spoils become the property of the king, who will determine—based on the effectiveness of the parties involved and their alacrity to obey—their share.
“A prescribed rotation will detail which highprinces and armies are responsible for hunting gemhearts, and in what order. The pairings will not always be the same, and will be judged based on strategic compatibility. It is expected that by the Codes we all hold dear, the men and women of these armies will welcome this renewed focus on victory and, at long last, vengeance.”
The crier snapped the book closed, looking up at Kaladin and cocking a long black eyebrow he was pretty sure had been painted on with makeup.
“Thank you,” he said. She nodded to him, then moved off toward the next battalion square.
Kaladin climbed to his feet. “Well, there’s the storm we’ve been expecting.”
The men nodded. Conversation at Bridge Four had been subdued, following the strange break-in at Dalinar’s quarters yesterday. Kaladin felt a fool. Dalinar, however, seemed to be ignoring the break-in entirely. He knew far more than he was telling Kaladin. How am I supposed to do my job if I don’t have the information I need?
Not two weeks on the job, and already the politics and machinations of the lighteyes were tripping him up.
“The highprinces are going to hate this proclamation,” Leyten said from beside the firepit, where he was working on Beld’s breastplate straps, which had come from the quartermaster with the buckles twisted about. “They base pretty much everything on getting those gemhearts. We’re going to have discontent aplenty on today’s winds.”
“Ha!” Rock said, ladling up curry for Lopen, who had come back for seconds. “Discontent? Today, this will mean riots. Did you not hear that mention of the Codes? This thing, it is an insult against the others, whom we know do not follow their oaths.” He was smiling, and seemed to consider the anger—even