The Way of Kings (95 page)

The carriage turned, and the violet light of Salas illuminated Lirin’s face. He didn’t look half so ominous from that angle—in fact, he looked fragile. He clasped his hands before him, eyes reflecting moonlight. “Wistiow was not lucid during the final days, Kal,” he whispered. “I knew that, with his death, we would lose the promise of a union. Laral had not reached her day of majority, and the new citylord wouldn’t let a darkeyes take her inheritance through marriage.”

“So you
robbed
him?” Kal felt himself shrinking.

“I made certain that promises were kept. I had to do something. I couldn’t trust to the generosity of the new citylord. Wisely, as you can see.”

All of this time, Kal had assumed that Roshone was persecuting them out of malice and spite. But it turned out he was
justified
. “I can’t believe it.”

“Does it change so much?” Lirin whispered. His face looked haunted in the dim light. “What is different now?”

“Everything.”

“And yet nothing. Roshone still wants those spheres, and we still deserve them. Wistiow, if he’d been fully lucid, would have given us those spheres. I’m certain.”

“But he didn’t.”

“No.”

Things were the same, yet different. One step, and the world flipped upside down. The villain became the hero, the hero the villain. “I—” Kal said. “I can’t decide if what you did was incredibly brave or incredibly wrong.”

Lirin sighed. “I know how you feel.” He sat back. “Please, don’t tell Tien what we’ve done.” What
we’ve
done. Hesina had helped him. “When you are older, you’ll understand.”

“Maybe,” Kal said, shaking his head. “But one thing hasn’t changed. I want to go to Kharbranth.”

“Even on stolen spheres?”

“I’ll find a way to pay them back. Not to Roshone. To Laral.”

“She’ll be a Roshone before too long,” Lirin said. “We should expect an engagement between her and Rillir before the year is out. Roshone will not let her slip away, not now that he’s lost political favor in Kholinar. She represents one of the few chances his son has for an alliance with a good house.”

Kal felt his stomach turn at the mention of Laral. “I have to learn. Perhaps I can…”

Can what,
he thought.
Come back and convince her to leave Rillir for me? Ridiculous
.

He looked up suddenly at his father, who had bowed his head, looking sorrowful. He
was
a hero. A villain too. But a hero to his family. “I won’t tell Tien,” Kal whispered. “And I’m going to use the spheres to travel to Kholinar and study.”

His father looked up.

“I want to learn to face lighteyes, like you do,” Kal said. “Any of them can make a fool of me. I want to learn to talk like them, think like them.”

“I want you to learn so that you can help people, son. Not so you can get back at the lighteyes.”

“I think I can do both. If I can learn to be clever enough.”

Lirin snorted. “You’re plenty clever, son. You’ve got enough of your mother in you to talk circles around a lighteyes. The university will show you how, Kal.”

“I want to start going by my full name,” he replied, surprising himself. “Kaladin.” It was a man’s name. He’d always disliked how it sounded like the name of a lighteyes. Now it seemed to fit.

He wasn’t a darkeyed farmer, but he wasn’t a lighteyed lord either. Something in between. Kal had been a child who wanted to join the army because it was what other boys dreamed of. Kaladin would be a man who learned surgery and all the ways of the lighteyes. And someday he would return to this town and prove to Roshone, Rillir, and Laral herself that they had been wrong to dismiss him.

“Very well,” Lirin said. “Kaladin.”

“Born from the darkness, they bear its taint still, marked upon their bodies much as the fire marks their souls.”

—I consider Gashashson-Navammis a trustworthy source, though I’m not certain about this translation. Find the original quote in the fourteenth book of
Seld
and retranslate it myself, perhaps?

Kaladin floated.

Persistent fever, accompanied by cold sweats and hallucinations. Likely cause is infected wounds; clean with antiseptic to ward away rotspren. Keep the subject hydrated.

He was back in Hearthstone with his family. Only he was a grown man. The soldier he had become. And he didn’t fit with them anymore. His father kept asking, How did this happen? You
said
you wanted to become a surgeon. A surgeon…

Broken ribs. Caused by trauma to the side, inflicted by a beating. Wrap the chest and prevent the subject from taking part in strenuous activity.

Occasionally, he’d open his eyes and see a dark room. It was cold, the walls made of stone, with a high roof. Other people lay in lines, covered in blankets. Corpses. They were corpses. This was a ware house where they were lined up for sale. Who bought corpses?

Highprince Sadeas. He bought corpses. They still walked after he bought them, but they
were
corpses. The stupid ones refused to accept it, pretending they were alive.

Lacerations on face, arms, and chest. Outer layer of skin stripped away in several patches. Caused by prolonged exposure to highstorm winds. Bandage wounded areas, apply a denocax salve to encourage new skin growth.

Time was passing. A lot of it. He should be dead. Why wasn’t he dead? He wanted to lie back and let it happen.

But no.
No.
He had failed Tien. He had failed Goshel. He had failed his parents. He had failed Dallet. Dear Dallet.

He would not fail Bridge Four. He would
not
!

Hypothermia, caused by extreme cold. Warm subject and force him to remain seated. Do not let him sleep. If he survives a few hours, there will likely be no lasting aftereffects.

If he survives a few hours…

Bridgemen weren’t supposed to survive.

Why would Lamaril say that? What army would employ men who were supposed to die?

His perspective had been too narrow, too shortsighted. He needed to understand the army’s objectives. He watched the battle’s progress, horrified. What had he done?

He needed to go back and change it. But no. He was wounded, wasn’t he? He was bleeding on the ground. He was one of the fallen spearmen. He was a bridgeman from Bridge Two, betrayed by those fools in Bridge Four, who diverted all of the archers.

How dare they? How
dare
they?

How dare they survive by killing me!

Strained tendons, ripped muscles, bruised and cracked bones, and pervasive soreness caused by extreme conditions. Enforce bed rest by any means necessary. Check for large and persistent bruises or pallor caused by internal hemorrhaging. That can be life-threatening. Be prepared for surgery.

He saw the deathspren. They were fist-size and black, with many legs and deep red eyes that glowed, leaving trails of burning light. They clustered around him, skittering this way and that. Their voices were whispers, scratchy sounds like paper being torn. They terrified him, but he couldn’t escape them. He could barely move.

Only the dying could see deathspren. You saw them, then died. Only the very, very lucky few survived after that. Deathspren knew when the end was close.

Blistered fingers and toes, caused by frostnip. Make sure to apply antiseptic to any blisters that break. Encourage the body’s natural healing. Permanent damage is unlikely.

Standing before the deathspren was a tiny figure of light. Not translucent, as she had always appeared before, but of pure white light. That soft, feminine face had a nobler, more angular cast to it now, like a warrior from a forgotten time. Not childlike at all. She stood guard on his chest, holding a sword made of light.

That glow was so pure, so sweet. It seemed to be the glow of life itself. Whenever one of the deathspren got too close, she would charge at it, wielding her radiant blade.

The light warded them off.

But there were a lot of deathspren. More and more each time he was lucid enough to look.

Severe delusions caused by trauma to the head. Maintain observation of subject. Do not allow alcohol intake. Enforce rest. Administer fathom bark to reduce cranial swelling. Firemoss can be used in extreme cases, but beware letting the subject form an addiction.

If medication fails, trepanning the skull may be needed to relieve pressure.

Usually fatal.

Teft entered the barrack at midday. Ducking into the shadowy interior was like entering a cave. He glanced to the left, where the other wounded usually slept. They were all outside at the moment, getting some sun. All five were doing well, even Leyten.

Teft passed the lines of rolled-up blankets at the sides of the room, walking to the back of the chamber where Kaladin lay.

Poor man,
Teft thought.
What’s worse, being sick near to death, or having to stay all the way back here, away from the light?
It was necessary. Bridge Four walked a precarious line. They had been allowed to cut Kaladin down, and so far nobody had tried to stop them from caring for him. Practically the entire army had heard Sadeas give Kaladin to the Stormfather for judgment.

Gaz had come to see Kaladin, then had snorted to himself in amusement. He’d likely told his superiors that Kaladin would die. Men didn’t live long with wounds like those.

Yet Kaladin hung on. Soldiers were going out of their way to try to get a peek at him. His survival was incredible. People were talking in camp. Given to the Stormfather for judgment, then spared. A miracle. Sadeas wouldn’t like that. How long would it be before one of the lighteyes decided to relieve their brightlord of the problem? Sadeas couldn’t take any overt action—not without losing a great deal of credibility—but a quiet poisoning or suffocation would abbreviate the embarrassment.

So Bridge Four kept Kaladin as far from outside eyes as possible. And they always left someone with him. Always.

Storming man,
Teft thought, kneeling beside the feverish patient in his tousled blankets, eyes closed, face sweaty, body bound with a frightful number of bandages. Most were stained red. They didn’t have the money to change them often.

Skar kept watch currently. The short, strong-faced man sat at Kaladin’s feet.

“How is he?” Teft asked.

Skar spoke softly. “He seems to be getting worse, Teft. I heard him mumble about dark shapes, thrashing and telling them to keep back. He opened his eyes. He didn’t seem to see me, but he saw
something
. I swear it.”

Deathspren,
Teft thought, feeling a chill.
Kelek preserve us.

“I’ll take a turn,” Teft said, sitting. “You go get something to eat.”

Skar stood, looking pale. It would crush the others’ spirit for Kaladin to survive the highstorm, then die of his wounds. Skar shuffled from the room, shoulders slumped.

Teft watched Kaladin for a long while, trying to gather his thoughts, his emotions. “Why now?” he whispered. “Why here? After so many have watched and waited, you come here?”

But of course, Teft was getting ahead of himself. He didn’t
know
for certain. He only had assumptions and hopes. No, not hopes—
fears
. He had rejected the Envisagers. And yet, here he was. He fished in his pocket and pulled out three small diamond spheres. It had been a long, long while since he’d saved anything of his wages, but he’d held on to these, thinking, worrying. They glowed with Stormlight in his hand.

Did he really want to know?

Gritting his teeth, Teft moved closer to Kaladin’s side, looking down at the unconscious man’s face. “You bastard,” he whispered. “You storming bastard. You took a bunch of hanged men and lifted them up just enough to breathe. Now you’re going to leave them? I won’t have it, you hear. I
won’t
.”

He pressed the spheres into Kaladin’s hand, wrapping the limp fingers around them, then laying the hand on Kaladin’s abdomen. Then Teft sat back on his heels. What would happen? All the Envisagers had were stories and legends. Fool’s tales, Teft had called them. Idle dreams.