Rhythm of War (The Stormlight Archive, #4)

by Brandon Sanderson

Over the last year, new varieties of Fused had been appearing on the battlefields in a trickle. Kaladin was most familiar with the ones who could fly like Windrunners. Those were called the shanay-im, they’d learned; it roughly meant “Those Ones of the Heavens.”

Other Fused could not fly; as with the Radiants, each type had their own set of powers. Jasnah posited there would be ten varieties, though Dalinar—offering no explanation of why he knew this—said there would be only nine.

Be careful, Syl said. We don’t know what kinds of powers this new Fused might— The fog-shrouded figure in the near distance collapsed suddenly, and something shot out of the body—a small line of red-violet light like a spren. That line of light darted to Kaladin in the blink of an eye, then it expanded to re-form the shape of the Fused with a sound like stretching leather mixed with grinding stone.

The Fused’s constricting fingers cut off Kaladin’s airflow, but with Stormlight raging inside him, Kaladin didn’t need to breathe.

Kaladin screamed and felt his limbs go numb as his spinal cord was severed. His Stormlight rushed to heal the wound, but this Fused was plainly experienced at fighting Surgebinders, because he continued to plunge the knife

into Kaladin’s neck time and time again, keeping him from recovering. “Kaladin!” Syl said, flitting around him. “Kaladin! What should I do?” She formed into a shield in his hand, but his limp fingers dropped her, and she returned to her spren form.

This creature used Voidlight to form new bodies somehow. Each one looked identical, with hair as a kind of clothing. He wasn’t being reborn each time—he was teleporting, but using the ribbon of light to transfer between locations. They’d met Fused that could fly, and others that had powers like Lightweavers. Perhaps this was the variety whose powers mirrored, in a way, the traveling abilities of Elsecallers.

Both spur and hair seemed to imply he couldn’t take objects with him when teleporting—so he couldn’t keep Voidlight spheres on his person, but had to retreat to refill.

Shallan tried to focus on the accounts. She could do these numbers; she’d first trained on accounting when doing her father’s ledgers. That had begun before she … Before she … It might be time, Veil whispered. To remember, once and for all. Everything. No, it was not. But … Shallan retreated immediately. No, we can’t think of that. Take control.

Something more we don’t know about Shallan’s past?

Funny! Someone actually trying to get kidnapped.

“I’m a soldier, Father,” Kaladin said. “I fight for these people.” “Any idiot with hands can hold a spear. I trained your hands for something better.”

She’d started this design using old chasm-spanning bridges as a model. After all, this wasn’t a warship, but a transport intended to move large groups of people. The end construction was little more than a large wooden rectangle: over a hundred feet long, sixty feet wide, and around forty feet thick to support three decks.

They had built high walls and a roof on the rear portion of the upper deck. The front third was exposed to the air, with a railing around the sides. For most of the trip, Navani’s engineers had maintained their command post in the sheltered portion. But with the need for delicate maneuvers today, they’d moved the tables out and bolted them to the deck in the right front corner of the platform.

Deciding upon a name had taken her months of deliberation. In the end, however, she’d taken inspiration from the bridges that had inspired her. In specific, the one that had—so many months ago—rescued Dalinar and Adolin from certain death, something she hoped this vessel would do for many others in similarly dire situations. And so, the world’s first air transport had been named the Fourth Bridge.

A dozen Edgedancers flowed out toward the town. Glowing with Stormlight, they moved with a strange gait—alternating pushing off with one foot while sliding on the other. They could glide across wood or stone as if it were ice, and gracefully leaped over stones.

“My dear, if these things become ubiquitous, it won’t only be navies that are rendered obsolete. I can’t decide if I’m glad to be old enough to wish my world a fond farewell, or if I envy the young lads who get to explore this new world.”

“I’m running low on Light, sir.” Navani slipped her notebook from her pocket as Dalinar raised his hand and pressed it against Kaladin’s chest. There was a faint … warping to the air around them, and for a moment she thought she could see into Shadesmar. Another realm, filled with beads of glass and candle flames floating in place of people’s souls. She thought, for the briefest moment, she heard a tone in the distance. A pure note vibrating through her.

Dalinar’s powers were related to the composition of Stormlight, the three realms, and—ultimately—the very nature of deity. There were secrets here to unlock.

Kaladin’s Light was renewed, wisps of it steaming off his skin, visible even in daylight. The spheres he carried would be renewed as well. Somehow Dalinar reached between realms to touch the Almighty’s own power, an ability once reserved solely for storms and the things that lived in them.

She knew the tower had once been occupied by a powerful spren named the Sibling. A spren on the level of the Nightwatcher or the Stormfather—and capable of making a Bondsmith. She had to assume the spren, or perhaps something about its relationship with a human, had allowed the tower to function. Unfortunately, the Sibling had died during the Recreance. She wasn’t certain what level of “dead” that meant. Was the Sibling dead like the souls of Shardblades that still walked around? Some spren she interviewed said the Sibling was “slumbering,” but they treated that as final.

Chanaranach’Elin, Herald of the Common Man.

She darted upward, and Kaladin swooped to follow. As he did, an explosion of light expanded below. For a brief moment Kaladin glimpsed Shadesmar, and he soared in a black sky marked by strange clouds flowing like a roadway.

A wave of power surged through the battlefield, causing Windrunners to burst alight. Dalinar had fully opened a perpendicularity, becoming a reservoir of Stormlight that would instantly renew any Radiant who drew near. It was a powerful edge, and one of the reasons they continued to risk bringing the Bondsmith on missions.

Leshwi’s spear was lined with a silvery metal that resisted Shardblade cuts.

More importantly, it was set with a gemstone at its base. If the weapon struck Kaladin, that gemstone would suck away Kaladin’s Stormlight and render him unable to heal—a potentially deadly tool against a Radiant, even one infused by Dalinar’s perpendicularity.

“Without you, I’d be as dumb as a rock. And without me you’d fly like one. I think we’re better off not worrying about what we could do without the other.” She folded her arms. “Besides, what would I do if I caught her? Glare at her? I need you for the stabby-stabby part.”

In the past, the Fused had focused their attacks on Dalinar. Today they buzzed the ship—but didn’t try to strike at the Bondsmith. They were afraid of him for reasons nobody yet understood, and only committed to a full assault on him if they had overwhelming numbers and ground support.

A ribbon of red light streaked in from the side. Kaladin immediately Lashed himself backward and spun, weapon out. He hadn’t realized he’d been dedicating a part of his energy to watching for that red light. It darted away from him now that he’d noticed it. Kaladin tried to follow it with his eyes, but couldn’t keep track of it as it maneuvered among the homes below.

He waved to his older children—including Cord, who carried Amaram’s old Shardbow strapped to her back and wore the full set of Shardplate she’d found in Aimia.

The ball of light was bright blue. Part of Navani felt it should be red—to reveal the true nature of the spren that hid inside Renarin. A Voidspren. Or at least an ordinary spren corrupted to the enemy’s side. None of them knew what to do about that fact, least of all Renarin. As with most Radiants, he hadn’t known what he was doing when he began. Now that he’d formed the bond, it was too late to turn back.

Renarin claimed the spren was trustworthy, but something was odd about his powers. They had managed to recruit several standard Truthwatchers—and they could create illusions like Shallan. Renarin couldn’t do that. He could only summon lights, and they did strange, unnatural things sometimes.…

Navani trailed off as she picked out the man in question standing atop a hill—distinctly separated from the battle. Navani could see why Rushu would think him a Windrunner. He wore a uniform after the exact cut of Bridge Four. In fact, Rushu—who paid attention to the oddest things, but never seemed to notice important details—might have once seen this man in their ranks. He’d often been at Kaladin’s side during the early months of Bridge Four’s transition into Dalinar’s army.

Rushu missed the fact that this man’s uniform was black, that he wore no patch on his shoulder. That his narrow face and lean figure would mark him as a man interdicted. A traitor. Moash. The man who had killed Navani’s son.

And as it had always been when he was young, the door was slightly ajar and crusted over with the cocoons of lurgs: little creatures that spent days hiding inside their coverings, waiting for rain to wake them up.

The lurgs started dropping from their cocoons, thinking rain had come. They began hopping around, causing the door to creak. Leshwi immediately spun and leveled her lance toward them.

Have you asked yourself what they want? What they expect to get out of the end of the world?” “Power,” Veil said. “Ah, nebulous ‘power.’ No, it is more specific than that. Most of the Sons of Honor simply wanted their gods back, but Gavilar saw more. He saw entire worlds.…”

“Adolin,” she said. “Something is wrong with this. With Ialai, with me being here, with—” She cut herself off as shouts sounded in the antechamber. Shallan scrambled out, feeling a sense of dread. She found Ialai Sadeas lying on the floor, foam coming from the mouth of her fake face. The soldiers watched with horror. The highprincess stared up with lifeless eyes. Dead.

Godeke the Edgedancer.

There, Kaladin thought as the expected ribbon of red light came darting toward him. He will go for my back again. Kaladin dropped his spear, pulled a throwing knife off his belt, and turned. He rammed the knife into the air right before the Fused appeared—slamming the small blade into the creature’s neck, angled between two pieces of carapace.

The Fused let out an urk of shock and pain, his eyes wide.

Anyway, eating it isn’t the best. If you can get it into the blood though, it kills quickly.…”

About Blackbane

Shallan knew of blackbane herself. She’d studied up on poisons recently. Would I be able to spot a pinprick? Shallan thought, kneeling beside the corpse. Either way, she suspected Ialai had been right: The Ghostbloods hadn’t trusted Shallan to kill her, and they’d sent a second knife to see the job done. That would mean they had an operative among Adolin’s guards or Shallan’s own agents. The idea made Shallan’s stomach twist. And this person was separate from the spy Ialai supposedly had among Dalinar’s elite? Storms. It was tying Shallan’s mind in knots. “Look the body over,” Shallan whispered to Ishnah. “See if you can find evidence if this was self-inflicted, or if someone else killed her.”

“Have you experienced anything like that before?” She shook her head. “Not that I remember. It made me feel … faded. As if I wasn’t quite here.”

two burned-out pits, like charcoal, in place of the eyes. He’d been killed with a Shardblade.

Moash … had been his friend. They’d spent hours by the fire, talking about their lives. Kaladin had opened his heart to this man, in ways he hadn’t to most of the others. He’d told Moash, like Teft and Rock, of Tien. Of Roshone. Of his fears. Moash wasn’t just a friend though. He was beyond that a member of Bridge Four. Kaladin had sworn to the storms and the heavens above—if anyone was there watching—that he’d protect those men.

Kaladin had failed Moash. As soundly as he’d failed Dunny, Mart, and Jaks. And of them all, losing Moash hurt the most. Because in those callous eyes, Kaladin saw himself.

Kaladin knelt, bathed in that warm light. Yes, warmth. Kaladin felt warm. Surely … if there truly was a deity … it watched him from within that light. The light faded, and a spindly young man with black and blond hair rushed forward to grab Kaladin. “Sir!” Renarin asked. “Kaladin, sir? Are you all right? Are you out of Stormlight?” “I…” Kaladin shook his head. “What…” “Come on,” Renarin said, getting under his arm to help lift him. “The Fused have retreated. The ship is ready to leave!” Kaladin nodded, numb, and let Renarin help him stand.

“Kaladin,” Syl said, “it’s getting worse. This … distance to your expression, this fatigue. It happens whenever you run out of Stormlight. As if … you can only keep going while it’s in you.”

Is the Stormlight causing him to feel uplifted. Is it becoming a drug to him to keep away from his depression?

Jasnah loved secrets. Navani was more wary of them. Secrets had turned Gavilar into … whatever it was he’d been at the end. Even today, the greed of artifabrians across the world prevented the greater society from learning, growing, and creating—all in the name of preserving trade secrets.

She reached down beside her chair and picked up the fabrial Kaladin and Lift had discovered. She had no idea what to make of the thing. A collection of four garnets? No spren appeared to be trapped in any of them. She didn’t recognize the metal of its cage, the cut of its gemstones.… Studying the thing was like trying to understand a foreign language. How had it suppressed the Radiants’ abilities? Was this related to the gemstones embedded in the weapons of the enemy soldiers, the ones that drained away Stormlight? So many storming secrets. She held up a sketch of the gemstone pillar at the heart of Urithiru. It is the same, she thought, turning the fabrial in her hand, then comparing it to a similar-looking construction of garnets in the picture. The ones in the pillar were enormous, but the cut, the arrangement of stones, the feel was the same. Why would the tower have a device to suppress the powers of Radiants? It was their home.