Wind and Truth (The Stormlight Archive, #5)

by Brandon Sanderson

“Most of you once served him,” Tanavast said. “He granted you his powers. There is a Connection we can exploit, so long as the circle contains enough of you. Strongest would be sixteen or my own number of ten—it cannot be nine. If you speak oaths to me, my power can be channeled and governed by rules to prevent a cataclysm. I will take back your Surges, then grant them anew, and together you will become a force that both protects Roshar and binds the enemy away from it.”

“This will start the bond,” Ishar said. “Only once it is complete can Vedel seal immortality upon us—using our Connection to Honor to tap into constantly rejuvenating Investiture from the Spiritual Realm, locking our souls at our current age. This way we can be reborn again and again.”

“Just because your life gave you the luxury of simplicity doesn’t mean the world was magically less complex,”

“Maybe I should have joined the dissenters.” “The what?” Kaladin said. The spren looked away.

They are the last pieces of Honor, Kaladin. Siphoned off, held apart. They are more important than you can know.

More and more, she was trying to let the points of light—not the darkness between them—guide her.

infusing myself with the full power of his perpendicularity.

In that instant, something ripped within the world itself. Roshar’s rhythms and tones froze. Like a heart suddenly stopped. Three terrible seconds.

“You,” Honor said, “are destruction incarnate. You are as Dawnshards. You will soon become Surges unbounded, as I cannot watch you any longer. The Radiants will end this planet.”

Hold to the morals he’d begun to find for himself, or bow before the pressure of expectations?

It was the meaning of “journey before destination.” And Kaladin believed it. That would have to be enough.

They need … you, Szeth. This pilgrimage, it’s an audition. Jezrien is dead. And you are to take his—”

Pieces of the sky, fallen here. Watched over by strange people. Secrets even the gods didn’t understand.

“Chana,” he said. “I need you to join Kalak and myself in Kholinar. Our work grows more difficult.” Nale. Kalak. Chana.

But context didn’t excuse actions, only helped give reasons for them.

Yes, it might hurt you now and then. But everything you love is going to hurt you now and then, because it is flawed.”

Shallan had killed her and sent her to Braize, where she had broken and come back to Roshar. Initiating the Return, unleashing the Voidbringers, and starting all of this.

Unite them. Who he had been. Who he was. Who he would become.

“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.

a Dawnshard, one of the four core forces by which a god had been Shattered. Something beyond common Surges. Something primal.

But Odium’s power … it dislikes him, thinks him weak. Mishram found its hiding place,

I REALIZED TOO LATE THAT THERE WAS SOMETHING STRANGE ABOUT THIS LAND, BENEATH THIS CITY. PIECES OF SOMETHING FALLEN. A … FOURTH MOON? IN SPLINTERS? IT REACTED TO US, AND I SAW PEOPLE THERE—NEW ONES, WATCHERS, WHO HAD BEEN HIDDEN FROM ME.

No one is normal. Normal doesn’t exist.

This was the future he wanted. It wasn’t the one that others might have chosen, and wasn’t one that many would have chosen for him. He wasn’t even certain it was right, but it was what he wanted. He would merely have to hope that those who cared for him would understand that the decision was his to make, not theirs.

THE PIECE THAT KNEW THAT I, AND THE FIFTEEN OTHERS, HAD DONE SOMETHING TERRIBLE ON YOLEN.

The dirty secret is that all governments are quietly republics—the voting is simply done with the sword or with coin. Everyone conveniently neglects to tell the lower class that it’s their coin, and their lack of swords.

“Occasionally,” Nin said, “a group of them refuses my leadership. Billid claimed … to have found old Skybreaker oaths. I thought it ridiculous at the time…”

“I am my own agent,” Szeth shouted. “I make my own choices. I. Am. THE LAW!” Light erupted around him.

“I will protect myself, so that I may continue to protect others.”

Honor was born again in Dalinar Kholin.

“Yes,” a quiet voice said. “Honor is dead.”

“But,” Stormblessed said, “I’ll see what I can do.”

You cannot have him, the powers said, for he is claimed by another.

“I didn’t know what to do. Thing is, that’s wonderful. That’s the point. Because when the predetermined answers flee, then the solution comes down to who you are. That’s when we see the mettle of a person. That is art: when untested skill meets unplanned catastrophe.”