Words of Radiance (The Stormlight Archive, #2)

by Brandon Sanderson

the knife’s tip touching the end of his left nostril. “My father,” Adolin said with a grunt, sweat from his nose dripping down onto the blade of the knife, “thinks I’m a better man than he is.” He strained, and felt Sadeas’s grip weaken. “Unfortunately for you, he’s wrong.” Sadeas whimpered. With a surge, Adolin forced the blade up past Sadeas’s nose and into the eye socket—piercing the eye like a ripe berry—then rammed it home into the brain.

“Kaladin will only have time to save a few,” Shallan said. “If that many. There are four of us, Brightlord. Only four against a storm full of destruction . . .” “It is what it is.” “So many will die.” “And we will save the ones we can,” Dalinar said. He turned to her. “Life before death, Radiant. It is the task to which we are now sworn.” She pursed her lips, still looking eastward, but nodded. “Life before death, Radiant.”