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The sun could love the stars. But never as an equal.
A common failing among men who wished to appear strong. It was not weakness to relax. By being so afraid of it, they gave simple things power over them.
If there was a group more demanding than sergeants, it was mothers. When he’d been younger such attention had mortified him. After years without, he found he didn’t mind a little mothering.
“I wish I had fatherly advice for you,” Lirin said, “but you’ve far outpaced my understanding of life. So I guess, go and be yourself. Protect. I … I love you.”
“If it weren’t for that capacity, then what good would choices be? If we never had the power to do terrible things, then what heroism would it be to resist?”
“Take it from a guy who is all too capable with a lie: nothing is easier to sell someone than the story they want to hear.
“A virtue is something that is valuable even if it gives you nothing. A virtue persists without payment or compensation. Positive thinking is great. Vital. Useful. But it has to remain so even if it gets you nothing. Belief, truth, honor … if these exist only to get you something, you’ve missed the storming point.”
“But now what? Who am I without the spear?” “Won’t it be exciting to find out?” Wit said. “Have you ever wondered who you would be if there was no one you needed to save, no one you needed to kill? You’ve lived for others for so long, Kaladin. What happens when you try living for you?” Wit held up his finger. “I know you can’t answer yet. Go and find out.”
Remember that is our purpose. Protect those who cannot protect themselves. That is who you are. Keep your ranks open for anyone who shares that ideal.”
“I need the person who will keep them the safest. In this case, that’s the man who cares the most, who knows the most, and whose judgment I respect. You. If you don’t trust yourself, trust me.
By removing the capacity for violence, he would also remove the capacity for mercy.
That we prevent war by building up societies where people choose peace. We prevent greed by nurturing governments where the greedy are held accountable. We take time, and we steer, but we do not dominate.”
Not merely skin to skin. Soul to soul. He ran his fingers through her wet hair, massaging her scalp, her cheek against his chest.
It seemed that whether or not she had time to spare, they were going to find it.
She didn’t know what terrified her more. The idea of some powerful, all-knowing deity that controlled everything—destroying her free will, yet for some reason still leaving the entire world in so much pain. Or the knowledge that there were beings who ruled the cosmere with immense power—but they had all the foibles, flaws, and limited morality of anyone else.
“What is right,” she said, “is not so easy as swearing an oath, Uncle. It’s about what brings the greatest good to the most people—and sometimes that requires making difficult decisions.”
A pleasant term for an unpleasant idea—people who must kill so ordinary men and women can live peaceful lives. Radiants must bathe in blood and tarnish their souls in order to forge peace.”
“How do I find what I need if the world is constantly in crisis?”
In that—at the edge of the world and the advent of the end of all things—Kaladin Stormblessed allowed himself to be happy.
My father and I disagree on a number of things, but there’s one point on which we do agree: any man, anywhere, should have the right to pick up the spear or sword and fight for what he believes in. If you deny Yanagawn that, you deny him manhood itself.”
Every advantage was also a liability, when you depended on it too much.
It ignored the fact that none of these soldiers really fought for their country or their ideals. Not in the moment. It might have been why they signed up; maybe it was why they said they fought. But in the sweat and blood and chaos and storm of the battle, they fought for none of that. They fought for one another.
“First step to being a soldier: take responsibility for your part and what it can cost others if you don’t do a good job.
For in his Ascension to godhood, he’d obtained a wisdom that eluded most mortals. A simple, reasonable precept: if someone you deeply respected disagreed with you, perhaps it was worth reconsidering.
“My moral philosophy is to do the most good I can in any situation,”
It was a curious quirk of medicine that a placebo often worked even if you knew you were being given a placebo. This situation showed why, with a kind of inverse example. A feint could work even if you knew it was a feint, because it left you worried about what else you might be missing.
It is the scientist’s duty to make that which was once unknowable so commonplace that you can wear it on your arm and think nothing of it.”
And for the first time in over four thousand years, the Bearer of Agonies fought back.
He was Radiant. He was Truthwatcher. He was Glys’s companion. He was Bridge Four. So much about the world didn’t make sense to him, but he knew why he was here, and that gave him a path forward.
Szeth deserves to make his own choices, he thought. If I step in, I take that from him—and that’s not who I want to be.
If I don’t control myself, I can’t protect, can’t help. If I let what Tien’s death did to me happen again and again, I will break. I can’t keep a stranglehold on those I love. And finally, most potent of all: I have to live for myself. Let him go for now.
“A little,” Renarin said. “The thing is, the deepest truths always sound a little trite. Because we all know them, and feel foolish being reminded.”
“You can’t punish soldiers for making good decisions—or sometimes even those who make the wrong ones. You need officers to feel comfortable making decisions. If you muddle that with a fear of repercussions, the result is indecisive leadership. And the result of that is disaster.”
“They have,” Adolin said, squeezing her hands. “Shallan, my life is yours, my strength is yours, and our journeys are now one. My oath to you is love. Forever.”
“Adolin,” she whispered, remembering the words she’d spoken as if they were new, “my life is yours. My strength, always, is yours. When you are weak, let me be strong. When I am weak, please lend me your strength. And when we are both weak, at least we will not be alone. Never again alone, for our journeys have together become one. My love, forever. This is my oath.”
for he was the thing shadows and flames feared. He was a man who did not care what they revealed.
“The path,” Dalinar whispered, “is filled with pain.” “Your pain.” “Yes.” “Your pain,” the voice said. “All men have the same ultimate destination, Dalinar. But we are not creatures of destinations. It is the journey that shapes us. Our callused feet. Your callused feet. Our backs strong from carrying the weight of our travels. Your back strong from carrying the weight of your travels. Our eyes open. Your. Eyes. Open. You kept the pain, Dalinar. Remember that. For the substance of our existence is not in the achievement, but in the method…”
“Maybe that’s the point. Maybe emotions don’t make us weak. Maybe they teach us. Like the pain of touching a hot stove. They show us what we should do, and remind us what we should not.”
“No,” Dalinar replied. “Understanding has never led to hatred. Show me. I cannot take your pain, but I can help you carry it.”
The best way to win is to provide your opponent with no options but to lose. But beware the assumption that you have considered every possibility.
We’ll always find someone to fight, if we look.
and volition are enormous goods unto themselves—and being protected from harm, yet being dominated without the chance to speak or fight for yourself, is not a true good.
They assume I replace religious ideology with an ideology of their absence. That is not the case. I am against dogma of any variety. God, nationality, or philosophy—when you become a slave to it without capacity to change or reconsider, that is the problem.”
“Two weaker forces,” May said, “will always align against the strongest one. By presenting strength, you become a target, galvanizing your enemies to put aside their differences.”
Because, he thought, this is where the journey has brought me. The oath wasn’t journey without destination. And today … today was about where he’d arrived, and how the journey had prepared him.
“I am my own agent,” Szeth shouted. “I make my own choices. I. Am. THE LAW!”
“Watchers,” Adolin said, “at the rim.” She nodded, and he felt her thoughts. Oaths had fallen, but she would not let him fight alone.
“I see it now. All men should be the law, spren. All men should follow it not because it is the law, but because they have decided to do so. We should fight it when it is wrong. That is … dangerous, because men can be right and wrong too. I can be. I will be.”
That this was the actual way of kings? Not Nohadon’s platitudes about helping. A deeper, darker truth: that a king’s duty was to take upon him the sins of an entire government.
You could never be smart enough. Jasnah had learned that. Nor could you just keep fighting forever. Kaladin had learned that. You couldn’t be strong enough, nor could you be perfectly honorable. That was what it was to be mortal. Sometimes you succeeded anyway. Sometimes you failed. Dalinar had experienced the breaking of oath after oath. Humans turning on singers. Singers turning from Honor to Odium. He’d even seen a god trying, as best he could, and finding no way out but to break his word.
