The Way of Kings, Part 1 (The Stormlight Archive #1.1)

The Parshendi were singing, many of them wearing beards that glowed with small uncut gemstones. Parshendi always sang as they fought; that song changed as they abandoned their bows—pulling out axes, swords, or maces—and threw themselves at the two Shardbearers.

Dalinar put himself at the optimal distance from Adolin, allowing his son to protect his blind spots, but not getting too close. The two Shardbearers fought, still near the lip of the chasm, cutting down the Parshendi who tried desperately to push them backward by sheer force of numbers. This was their best chance to defeat the Shardbearers. Dalinar and Adolin were alone, without their honor guard. A fall from this height would certainly kill even a man in Plate.

The Thrill rose within him, so sweet. Dalinar kicked away another corpse, though he didn’t need the extra room. They’d noticed that the Parshendi grew enraged when you moved their dead. He kicked another body, taunting them, drawing them toward him to fight in pairs as they often did.

He cut down a group that came, singing in voices angry at what he’d done to their dead. Nearby, Adolin began to lay about him with punches as the Parshendi got too close; he was fond of the tactic, switching between using his sword in two hands or one. Parshendi corpses flew this way and that, bones and armor shattered by the blows, orange Parshendi blood spraying across the ground. Adolin moved back to his Blade a moment later, kicking away a corpse.

The Thrill consumed Dalinar, giving him strength, focus, and power. The glory of the battle grew grand. He’d stayed away from this too long. He saw with clarity now. They did need to push harder, assault more plateaus, win the gemhearts.

Dalinar was the Blackthorn. He was a natural force, never to be halted. He was death itself. He—

He felt a sudden stab of powerful revulsion, a sickness so strong that it made him gasp. He slipped, partially on a patch of blood, but partially because his knees grew suddenly weak.

The corpses before him suddenly seemed a horrifying sight. Eyes burned out like spent coals. Bodies limp and broken, bones shattered where Adolin had punched them. Heads cracked open, blood and brains and entrails spilled around them. Such butchery, such death. The Thrill vanished.

How could a man enjoy this?

The Parshendi surged toward him. Adolin was there in a heartbeat, attacking with more skill than any other man Dalinar had known. The lad was a genius with the Blade, an artist with paint of only one shade. He struck expertly, forcing the Parshendi back. Dalinar shook his head, recovering his stance.

He forced himself to resume fighting, and as the Thrill began to rise again, Dalinar hesitantly embraced it. The odd sickness faded, and his battle reflexes took control. He spun into the Parshendi advance, sweeping out with his Blade in broad, aggressive strokes.

He needed this victory. For himself, for Adolin, and for his men. Why had he been so horrified? The Parshendi had murdered Gavilar. It was right to kill them.

He was a soldier. Fighting was what he did. And he did it well.

The Parshendi advance unit broke before his assault, scattering back toward a larger mass of their troops, who were forming ranks in haste. Dalinar stepped back and found himself looking down at the corpses around him, with their blackened eyes. Smoke still curled from a few.

The sick feeling returned.

Life ended so quickly. The Shardbearer was destruction incarnate, the most powerful force on a battlefield. Once these weapons meant protecting, a voice inside of him whispered.

The three bridges crashed to the ground a few feet away, and the cavalry charged across a moment later, led by compact Ilamar. A few windspren danced past in the air, nearly invisible. Adolin called for his horse, but Dalinar just stood, looking down at the dead. Parshendi blood was orange, and it smelled like mold. Yet their faces—marbled black or white and red—looked so human. A parshman nurse had practically raised Dalinar.

Life before death.

What was that voice?

He glanced back across the chasm, toward where Sadeas—well outside of bow range—sat with his attendants. Dalinar could sense the disapproval in his exfriend’s posture. Dalinar and Adolin risked themselves, taking a dangerous leap across the chasm. An assault of the type Sadeas had pioneered would cost more lives. But how many lives would Dalinar’s army lose if one of its Shardbearers was pushed into the chasm?

Gallant charged across the bridge alongside a line of soldiers, who cheered for the Ryshadium. He slowed near Dalinar, who grabbed the reins. Right now, he was needed. His men were fighting and dying, and this was not a time for regret or second-guessing.

A Plate-enhanced jump put him in the saddle. Then, Shardblade raised high, he charged into battle to kill for his men. That was not what the Radiants had fought for. But at least it was something.




They won the battle.

Dalinar stepped back, feeling fatigued as Adolin did the honors of harvesting the gemheart. The chrysalis itself sat like an enormous, oblong rockbud, fifteen feet tall and attached to the uneven stone ground by something that looked like crem. There were bodies all around it, some human, others Parshendi. The Parshendi had tried to get into it quickly and flee, but they’d only managed to get a few cracks into the shell.

The fighting had been most furious here, around the chrysalis. Dalinar rested back against a shelf of rock and pulled his helm off, exposing a sweaty head to the cool breeze. The sun was high overhead; the battle had lasted two hours or so.

Adolin worked efficiently, using his Shardblade with care to shave off a section of the outside of the chrysalis. Then he expertly plunged it in, killing the pupating creature but avoiding the region with the gemheart.

Just like that, the creature was dead. Now the Shardblade could cut it, and Adolin carved away sections of flesh. Purple ichor spurted out as he reached in, questing for the gemheart. The soldiers cheered as he pulled it free, gloryspren hovering above the entire army like hundreds of spheres of light.

Dalinar found himself walking away, helm held in his left hand. He crossed the battlefield, passing surgeons tending the wounded and teams who were carrying his dead back to the bridges. There were sleds behind the chull carts for them, so they could be burned properly back at camp.

There were a lot of Parshendi corpses. Looking at them now, he was neither disgusted nor excited. Just exhausted.

He’d gone to battle dozens, perhaps hundreds of times. Never before had he felt as he had this day. That revulsion had distracted him, and that could have gotten him killed. Battle was no time for reflection; you had to keep your mind on what you were doing.

The Thrill had seemed subdued the entire battle, and he hadn’t fought nearly as well as he once had. This battle should have brought him clarity. Instead, his troubles seemed magnified. Blood of my fathers, he thought, stepping up to the top of a small rock hill. What is happening to me?