hand back toward the scattered remnants of the feast, the departing lighteyes. “No, Wit. We failed. We crushed, we killed, and we have failed miserably.” He looked up. “I receive, in Alethkar, only what I have demanded. In taking the throne by force, we implied—no we screamed—that strength is the right of rule. If Sadeas thinks he is stronger than I am, then it is his duty to try to take the throne from me. These are the fruits of my youth, Wit. It is why we need more than tyranny, even the benevolent kind, to transform this kingdom. That is what Nohadon was teaching. And that is what I’ve been missing all along.”
Wit nodded, looking thoughtful. “I need to read that book of yours again, it seems. I wanted to warn you, however. I’ll be leaving soon.”
“Leave?” Dalinar said. “You only just arrived.”
“I know. It’s incredibly frustrating, I must admit. I have discovered a place that I must be, though to be honest I’m not exactly sure why I need to be there. This doesn’t always work as well as I’d like it to.”
Dalinar frowned at him. Wit smiled back affably.
“Are you one of them?” Dalinar asked.
“Excuse me?”
“A Herald.”
Wit laughed. “No. Thank you, but no.”
“Are you what I’ve been looking for, then?” Dalinar asked. “Radiant?”
Wit smiled. “I am but a man, Dalinar, so much as I wish it were not true at times. I am no Radiant. And while I am your friend, please understand that our goals do not completely align. You must not trust yourself with me. If I have to watch this world crumble and burn to get what I need, I will do so. With tears, yes, but I would let it happen.”
Dalinar frowned.
“I will do what I can to help,” Wit said, “and for that reason, I must go. I cannot risk too much, because if he finds me, then I become nothing—a soul shredded and broken into pieces that cannot be reassembled. What I do here is more dangerous than you could ever know.”
He turned to go.
“Wit,” Dalinar called.
“Yes?”
“If who finds you?”
“The one you fight, Dalinar Kholin. The father of hatred.” Wit saluted, then jogged off.
However, it seems to me that all things have been set up for a purpose, and if we—as infants—stumble through the workshop, we risk exacerbating, not preventing, a problem.
The Shattered Plains.
Kaladin did not claim these lands as he did the chasms, where his men had found safety. Kaladin remembered all too well the pain of bloodied feet on his first run, battered by this broken stone wasteland. Barely anything grew out here, only the occasional patch of rockbuds or set of enterprising vines draping down into a chasm on the leeward side of a plateau. The bottoms of the cracks were clogged with life, but up here it was barren.
The aching feet and burning shoulders from running a bridge had been nothing compared to the slaughter that had awaited his men at the end of a bridge run. Storms . . . even looking across the Plains made Kaladin flinch. He could hear the hiss of arrows in the air, the screams of terrified bridgemen, the song of the Parshendi.
I should have been able to save more of Bridge Four, Kaladin thought. If I’d been faster to accept my powers, could I have done so?
He breathed in Stormlight to reassure himself. Only it didn’t come. He stood, dumbfounded, while soldiers marched across one of Dalinar’s enormous mechanical bridges. He tried again. Nothing.
He fished a sphere from his pouch. The firemark glowed with its customary light, tinting his fingers red. Something was wrong. Kaladin couldn’t feel the Stormlight inside as he once had.
Syl flitted across the chasm high in the air with a group of windspren. Her giggling laughter rained down upon him, and he looked up. “Syl?” he asked quietly. Storms. He didn’t want to look like an idiot, but something deep within him was panicking like a rat caught by its tail. “Syl!”
Several marching soldiers glanced at Kaladin, then up toward the air. Kaladin ignored them as Syl zipped down in the form of a ribbon of light. She swirled around him, still giggling.
The Stormlight returned to him. He could feel it again, and he greedily sucked it from the sphere—though he did have the presence of mind to clutch the sphere in a fist and hold it to his chest to make the process less obvious. The Light of one mark wasn’t enough to expose him,