Wind and Truth (The Stormlight Archive, #5)

by Brandon Sanderson

“The more confusing, the better the literature.” “That might be the most pretentious thing I’ve ever heard.”

“You think that kid who starved didn’t want to eat? You think her parents didn’t want to escape the ravages of war badly enough? You think if they’d had more Passion, the cosmere would have saved them? How convenient to believe that people are poor because they didn’t care enough about being rich. That they just didn’t pray hard enough. So convenient to make suffering their own fault, rather than life being unfair and birth mattering more than aptitude. Or storming Passion.”

“That’s it, eh?” Wit said. “Just you becoming your world’s first therapist.” Kaladin glanced at Syl, who shook her head. “We have no idea what that is, Wit.” “Because,” Wit said, “you haven’t finished inventing it yet.” He leaned in. “About time someone figured out a method to counteract what I’ve been doing.

Who was Kaladin to do this? The only person available.

Molli the ewe had wandered onto the circular dance track again, and—bless her—was trying to eat the sacred rock. She never had been the smartest of the flock.

“Molli likes my dancing,” Szeth said softly. “Molli is blind,” Elid said. “She’s licking the dirt.” “Molli likes to try new experiences,” he said, smiling and looking toward the old ewe.

But let me teach a truth here that is often misunderstood: sometimes, it is not weakness, but strength, to stand up and walk away.

As I fear not the child with a weapon he cannot lift, I will never fear the mind of a man who does not think.

“Good,” Pattern said. “Excellent, even! Let’s go murder some folks!”

She shouldn’t have had to go through such a terrible, painful childhood—but since she had, she might as well storming weaponize it.

“I don’t want you to think you have to care for your old father. But I’ll go with you, Szeth, so you don’t have to go by yourself. It’s the only way I know how to help.” “Thank you,” Szeth whispered. “Thank you.”

“When I make noise like that,” he whispered, “it’s because I have so many emotions, I don’t know what to do with them all. So they burst from me like a storm.”

“This ‘therapy’ is too easy,” the spren said. “All you do is sit and listen, then tell me things I already kind of know.” “Remarkable,” Kaladin said, “how little we do things like that though, isn’t it?” The spren didn’t have a face, only a void of stars, but he seemed to be smiling as he replied. “It is remarkable. More so because I actually feel better.”

Fear the old man who welcomed failure when young. If he has survived this long, he learned. —Proverbs for Towers and War, Zenaz, date unknown

Nale slowed. “I do not pay attention to made-up stories.” “Pity,” Kaladin said. “They have proven to be some of the most real things in my life.”

It is often said that the best teacher is failure. This is true. But it is also the best killer. May you be lucky enough in failure to live, and unlucky enough in success to struggle. —Proverbs for Towers and War, Zenaz, date

how had they—or really, Lift—found the one who would actually make a great leader? Unless … how many people who lived in the gutters would have excelled if put in this seat?

People thought he was emotionless because he didn’t take part in their conversations or find what they did interesting, but they were wrong. He felt too many emotions.

They could all read each other better than he could read them, and that made them assume they understood him. When the truth was, he didn’t work by the same rules, and he never had. He saw the world from a different perspective.

He could make that his strength.

“We change the now, Glys,” Renarin said. “The future always begins with the now.”

This path leads to both pain and joy, Glys said. “So much better to feel,” Renarin said, “than to take the path that leads to only greyness and safe solitude.

An oath could be broken, but a promise? A promise stood as long as you were still trying. A promise understood that sometimes your best wasn’t enough. A promise cried with you when all went to Damnation. A promise came to help when you could barely stand. Because a promise knew that sometimes, being there was all you could offer.

Thoughts intruded and stabbed Kaladin’s mind, like spears in his flesh, making him scream his flaws.