sent him back to the ground with a careful Lashing of his own. Ahead, Szeth stumbled away from the princeling, holding out his sword wardingly toward Kaladin, eyes wide and lips trembling. Szeth looked horrified.
Good.
Dalinar finally landed on the plateau with a soft step, and Kaladin’s Lashing ran out.
“Seek shelter,” Kaladin said, the tempest in his veins dampening further. “I flew over a storm on my way here . . . a big one. Coming from the west.”
“We’re in the process of withdrawing.”
“Hurry,” Kaladin said. “I will deal with our friend.”
“Kaladin?”
Kaladin turned, glancing at the highprince, who stood tall, despite cradling one arm against his chest. Dalinar met his eyes. “You are what I’ve been looking for.”
“Yes. Finally.”
Kaladin turned and strode toward the assassin. He passed Bridge Four in a tight formation, and the men—at a barked command from Teft—threw something down before Kaladin. Blue lanterns, lit by oversized gems that had lasted the Weeping.
Bless them. Stormlight streamed up as he passed, filling him. With a sinking feeling, however, he noticed two corpses with burned-out eyes at their feet. Pedin and Mart. Eth clutched his brother’s body, weeping. Other bridgemen had lost limbs.
Kaladin snarled. No more. He would lose no further men to this monster.
“You ready?” he whispered.
Of course, Syl said in his head. I’m not the one we’ve been waiting on.
Burning with Stormlight, enraged and alight, Kaladin launched himself at the assassin and met him Blade against Blade.
* * *
“We’re dead . . .” Renarin muttered.
“Someone shut him up,” Shallan snapped. “Gag him if you have to.” She pointedly turned around, ignoring the raving prince. She still stood in the center of the muraled chamber. The pattern. What was the pattern?
A circular room. A thing on one side that adapted to fit different Shardblades. Depictions of Knights on the floor, glowing with Stormlight, pointing at a tower city, just as the myths described. Ten lamps on the walls. The lock hung over what she thought was a depiction of Natanatan, the kingdom of the Shattered Plains. It—
Ten lamps. With gems in them. Latticework of metal enclosing each one.
Shallan blinked, a shock running through her.
“It’s a fabrial.”
* * *
The assassin hurtled into the air. Captain Kaladin flew upward, chasing him, trailing Light.
“Status of the retreat!” Dalinar bellowed, crossing the plateau, his ribs smarting like nothing else, his wound from before little better. Storms. That one had faded as he fought, but now it ached something fierce. “Someone get me information!”
Scribes and ardents appeared from the nearby wreckage of tents. Shouts rose from around the plateau. The wind started to pick up—their period of reprieve, the short calm, was over. They needed to escape these plateaus. Now.
Dalinar reached Adolin and helped the young man to his feet. He looked quite a bit worse for wear, bruised, battered, dizzy. He flexed his right hand and winced in pain, then gingerly let it relax.
“Damnation,” Adolin said. “That bridgeboy is really one of them? The Knights Radiant?”
“Yes.”
Oddly, Adolin smiled, seeming satisfied. “Ha! I knew there was something wrong with that man.”
“Go,” Dalinar said, pushing Adolin along. “We need to get the army to move two plateaus over, that direction, where Shallan waits. Get over there and organize what you can.” He looked westward as the wind whipped up further, with bursts of rain. “Time is short.”
Adolin shouted for the bridgemen to join him, which they did, helping their wounded—though they were unfortunately forced to leave their dead. Several of them carried Adolin’s Shardplate as well, which was apparently spent.
Dalinar limped eastward across the plateau as fast as he could manage in his condition, searching for . . .
Yes. The place where he’d left Gallant. The horse snorted, shaking a wet mane. “Bless you, old friend,” Dalinar said, reaching the Ryshadium. Through the thunder and the chaos, the horse had not fled.
Dalinar moved much more easily once in the saddle, and eventually found Roion’s army pouring southward toward Shallan’s plateau, in organized ranks. He allowed himself a sigh of relief at their orderly march; the majority of the army had already crossed to the southern plateau, only one away from Shallan’s round one. That was wonderful. He couldn’t remember where Captain Khal had been sent, but with Roion himself fallen, Dalinar had assumed he’d left this army in chaos.
“Dalinar!” a voice called.
He turned to find the utterly incongruous sight of Sebarial and his mistress sitting beneath a canopy, eating dried sellafruit off a plate held by an awkward-looking soldier.
Sebarial raised a cup of wine toward