Words of Radiance (The Stormlight Archive, #2)

by Brandon Sanderson

He saw it in her eyes. The anguish, the frustration. The terrible nothing that clawed inside and sought to smother her. She knew. It was there, inside. She had been broken. Then she smiled. Oh, storms. She smiled anyway. It was the single most beautiful thing he’d seen in his entire life. ‘How?’ he asked.

One hour later, Shallan snuggled into a nest of warm blankets, wet hair on her neck, smelling of flowered perfume. She wore one of Navani’s dresses – which was too big for her. She felt like a child in her mother’s clothing. That was, perhaps, exactly what she was. Navani’s sudden affection was unexpected, but Shallan would certainly accept it. The bath had been glorious. Shallan wanted to curl up on this couch and sleep for ten days. For the moment, however, she let herself revel in the distinctive feeling of being clean, warm, and safe for the first time in what seemed like an eternity.

Queen Aesudan likes to feel that those around her are refined. It makes her feel refined by association.

Life could be tricky for a man who awoke each morning with a different level of intelligence.

He trusted them, for he needed to trust some people.

Fighting was not about glory, but about men lying on the ground screaming and thrashing, tangled in their own viscera.

“Honor” is a word applied to the actions of men from the past who have had their lives scrubbed clean by historians.’ He hesitated. ‘But . . . storm me for a fool, Dalinar, I wish they could be true.

‘You said you don’t have a lot of experience riding, so I picked a horse that had a lot of experience being ridden.

That girl never did have the decency to be wrong an appropriate amount of the time.’

‘I always just assumed she was born in her thirties.’

Figuring out the puzzles that captivated her . . . it will be like having her again.

Why did the soft sound of gentle rain make her feel more imaginative?

Contradictions. Those were what made people real. Jasnah exhausted, yet somehow still strong – stronger, even, because of the vulnerability she revealed. Jasnah terrified, yet also brave, for one allowed the other to exist. Jasnah overwhelmed, yet powerful.

‘Mmmmmm . . .’ Pattern said, content. ‘Humans can see the world as it is not. It is why your lies can be so strong. You are able to not admit that they are lies.’

‘It frightens me,’ Shallan said, ‘because we all see the world by some kind of light personal to us, and that light changes our perception. I don’t see clearly. I want to, but I don’t know if I ever truly can.’

When I try to be strong, I make a fool of myself. When I try to be merciful, people walk all over me. When I try to listen to counsel, it turns out I’ve picked the wrong men! When I try to do everything on my own, Dalinar has to take over lest I ruin the kingdom. ‘How do people know what to do? Why don’t I know what to do?

Kaladin felt exhausted. At least he’d stood up. It was the end. The journey had come and gone.

‘You’re a better man than I am. I was always a tyrant who had to learn to be something else. But you, you’ve been a good man from the start.

Wit sighed. It was night, which was normally a good time for dramatic arrivals and meaningful philosophy. Unfortunately for him, there was nobody here upon which to philosophize or visit, dramatically or otherwise.

‘Give me an audience who have come to be entertained, but who expect nothing special. To them, I will be a god.

‘Perhaps,’ he said, looking up toward the stars. ‘Whatever else might be said, at least the world chose a nice night upon which to end. . . .’