Dawnshard (The Stormlight Archive, #3.5)

by Brandon Sanderson

Ah, to be free of the “but why.”

She was grateful. And also frustrated. Not being able to walk was annoying, and that emotion people seemed to understand. But few understood the sense of embarrassment she felt—despite knowing she shouldn’t—at being a burden.

Most of Rysn’s contemporaries entered a discussion asking, “What can I get from this?” Rysn had been disabused of that notion early in her training. Her babsk taught a different way of seeing the world, training her to ask, “What need can I fulfill?”

“They’re trying to be good, velo. But they’re, you know, Alethi. Conquering folks is basically their primary cultural heritage. It’s taking some time for them to learn to see things another way—but they are listening.

He flopped down onto the deck beside her chair, rolling over and looking up. “Yeah, maybe. But it’s nice to make people laugh at you for something you do, and not something you can’t control. You know?”

“Like some kind of fragile vase that will tip off the shelf if upset. They can’t see me. They see the chair.” “They act so uncomfortable,” the Lopen continued. “They don’t want to look, and don’t want to bring it up, but it hovers about the conversation like a storming spren. But if you have the right joke . . .” “Brightness Rysn shouldn’t have to crack jokes at her own expense in order to make other people comfortable with their personal insecurities.” “Yup, true,” the Lopen said. “She shouldn’t have to.”

She shouldn’t have to do such things, but life was unfair, and so you controlled the situation as best you could.

“Radiant the Lopen,” Rysn said, “. . . um, what do you call a Thaylen who can’t walk?” “Not sure, gancha.” “Names. From afar.” He grinned widely. “Of course,” Rysn added, “I’d never stand for that sort of thing.”

“Aluminum,” Lopen said, still floating above the deck a few feet. “Yeah, it’s weird stuff. Can block a Shardblade, Rua tells me, if it’s thick enough. They get it from Soulcasting, though only a few can make it, so it’s pretty rare.”

The others called him silly, but he thought the different colors tasted different.

What kind of person sought work on a sailing vessel? The type who longed for freedom—who wasn’t content to sit where they were told, but instead wanted to see something new. A person who wanted to chase the horizon.

But he got the feeling that the captain was the kind of person who had been born an officer, coming right on out of her mom with a hat on and everything.

“Storms!” Fimkn said, stumbling over to help the other sailor. Fimkn had a medic background, and he and Lopen had bonded over the fact that both had been told too many storming times to boil bandages. “How did you . . . Lopen, you saved him!” “It’s kind of our thing,” Lopen said. Turlm sputtered, then started laughing uncontrollably. Joyspren like little blue leaves spun around him, then swirled into the air.

Well, not on Lopen’s watch. You didn’t let your friends drown in nameless oceans during a frigid storm. That was, sure, basic friendship rules right there.

“Can you believe it, older-cousin?” Lopen said. “Stepping foot on a land no person has ever visited.” “There was a city here, Lopen,” Huio said. “It was literally one of the capitals of the Epoch Kingdoms.” “Well, yeah,” Lopen said. “But, sure, there’s got to be a portion of it nobody ever stepped on, right?” “I wouldn’t bet on that,” he said. “Considering how long the Epoch Kingdoms stood and the expected population numbers.”

“Doesn’t mean a lady can’t lie on a big heap of gemstones,” Rushu said. “They talk about it in the stories. I’ve always wondered how uncomfortable it would be.”

The city had a curious shape, like a flower with radiating petals. The rest of the island was boring: one big long beach. Nothing moved; nothing seemed suspicious, which he figured was how a place that was suspicious would act.

“We had not expected to find one of the Sighted on this trip,” Nikli said in Veden. “You have long guarded Cultivation’s Perpendicularity.

But the very cosmere is at stake.

Not far past these, they entered a small room. It was perhaps fifteen feet square, and Rysn’s eyes were immediately drawn to the incredible mural that dominated the far wall. It depicted a sun being shattered into pieces.

That mural . . . it was circular and—inlaid with golden foil—it seemed to glow with its own light. The writing on parts of it was unfamiliar to Rysn; she hadn’t seen the script during any of her travels. It wasn’t even the Dawnchant. The peculiar letters were art themselves, curling around the outside of the exploding sun—which was divided into mostly symmetrical pieces. Four of them, each in turn broken into four smaller sections. Her spear slipped from her fingers and clattered to the floor.

She swore she could feel the heat of that sun, burning, washing over her. It was not angry, though she knew it was being ripped apart like a person on some awful torture device. She felt something emanating from it. Resignation? Confidence? Understanding?

You were brought here, she thought to herself, by one of the Guardians of Ancient Sins. Of course she had been. That made sense. Wait. Did it? Yes, she thought. You were. There are few of them left. And so the Sleepless take up the task.

She felt the mural looming. Overshadowing her. Slowly, she turned and gazed up at the exploding sun. Accept it. Know it. CHANGE. It stilled, waiting. Waiting for . . . “Yes,” Rysn whispered.

“You’ve got to say these words,” Lopen said, “and I said them, because they’re good words. But the Stormfather, sure, he has no sense of style.” He glanced up at the sky. “This would be a great time, O blustery one! I will protect those I hate! I’ve got it, you den gancho god thing!”

“We . . .” Nikli said. “We have seen the end of worlds, and vowed never to let such an awful event happen again. But we will kill the few to protect the many, if we must.”

“Please, gods of the ancient Herdazians,” Lopen whispered. “Don’t let me get killed by a monster that looks so stupid. Please.”

Nikli thought. “It is too dangerous,” he said. “If our enemies came here, they’d find our secret.” “Unless it wasn’t here,” Rysn said. “Unless it was somewhere completely unexpected—like in the mind of a random human woman. Who would assume you’d let one leave with something so powerful?

That armor you wear, however, has long been reserved for guardians of the Dawnshard. If you would bear it, you will bear that burden as well.”

Nikli laughed. “Mere words cannot explain. The Dawnshards are Commands, Rysn. The will of a god.”

“The most powerful forms of Surgebinding transcend traditional mortal understanding,” Nikli said. His body began to re-form, hordelings crawling back into place. “All their greatest applications require Intent and a Command. Demands on a level no person could ever manage alone. To make such Commands, one must have the reasoning—the breadth of understanding—of a deity. And so, the Dawnshards. The four primal Commands that created all things.” He paused. “And then eventually, they were used to undo Adonalsium itself. . . .”

“Larger greatshells need to bond mandras—you call them luckspren—to keep from crushing themselves to death with their own weight.

“So, Rysn is a Shardbearer now?” Cord asked. “A . . . Dawnshardbearer?” “No,” Nikli said. “She bears nothing. She is the Dawnshard now. That is how it works.” He bowed to Rysn. “We will speak again.”

Storms, she thought. What have I done? What you needed to, another part of her thought. You have adapted. You have Remade yourself. It was then that she grasped, in the smallest way, the nature of the Command inside her. The will of a god to remake things, to demand they be better. The power to change.

Storms. Was it her, or did this tea taste extra good? She inspected it, then glanced at the sunlight pouring through the porthole. Was it . . . brighter than usual? Why did the colors in her room look so exceptionally vivid all of a sudden?