Oathbringer: Book Three of the Stormlight Archive

“Stop with that,” Noro said sharply. He took a deep breath. “My squad, we’re on the wall next. You have half an hour to grab a drink or a nap, then assemble at our station above.”

“And storms be praised for that!” Beard said, heading straight for the stairwell, obviously planning to get to the station above, then relax. “I’ll happily take some time staring down an enemy army, thank you very much.”

Kaladin joined Beard in climbing. He still didn’t know where the man had gotten his nickname. Noro was the only one in the squad who wore a beard, though his wasn’t exactly inspiring. Rock would have laughed it to shame and euthanized it with a razor and some soap.

“Why do we pay off the highlords, Beard?” Kaladin asked as they climbed. “Velalant and his type are pretty useless, from what I’ve seen.”

“Yeah. We lost the real highlords in the riots or to the palace. But the highmarshal knows what to do. I suspect that if we didn’t share with people like Velalant, we’d have to fight them off from seizing the grain. At least this way, people are eventually getting fed, and we can watch the wall.”

They talked like that a lot. Holding the city wall was their job, and if they looked too far afield—tried too hard to police the city or bring down the cult—they’d lose their focus. The city had to stand. Even if it burned inside, it had to stand. To an extent, Kaladin agreed. The army couldn’t do everything.

It still hurt.

“When are you going to tell me how we make all that food?” Kaladin whispered.

“I…” Beard looked around in the stairwell. He leaned in. “I don’t know, Kal. But first thing that Azure did when he took command? Had us attack the low monastery, by the eastern gates, away from the palace. I know men from other companies who were on that assault. The place had been overrun by rioters.”

“They had a Soulcaster, didn’t they?”

Beard nodded. “Only one in the city that wasn’t at the palace when it … you know.”

“But how do we use it without drawing the screamers?” Kaladin asked.

“Well,” Beard said, and his tone shifted. “I can’t tell you all the secrets, but…” He launched into a story about the time Beard himself had learned to use a Soulcaster from the king of Herdaz. Maybe he wasn’t the best source of information.

“The highmarshal,” Kaladin interrupted. “Have you noticed the odd thing about her Shardblade? No gemstone on the pommel or crossguard.”

Beard eyed him, lit by the stairwell’s window slits. Calling the highmarshal a “she” always provoked a response. “Maybe that’s why the highmarshal never dismisses it,” Beard said. “Maybe it’s broken somehow?”

“Maybe,” Kaladin said. Aside from his fellow Radiants’ Blades, he’d seen one Shardblade before that didn’t have a gemstone on it. The Blade of the Assassin in White. An Honorblade, which granted Radiant powers to whoever held it. If Azure held a weapon that let her have the power of Soulcasting, perhaps that explained why the screamers hadn’t found out yet.

They finally emerged onto the top of the wall, stepping into sunlight. The two of them stopped there, looking inward over the flowing city—with the breaching windblades and rolling hills. The palace, ever in gloom, dominated the far side. The Wall Guard barely patrolled the section of wall that passed behind it.

“Did you know anyone in the Palace Guard ranks?” Kaladin asked. “Are any of the men in there still in contact with families out here or anything?”

Beard shook his head. “I got close a little while back. I heard voices, Kal. Whispering to me to join them. The highmarshal says we have to close our ears to those. They can’t take us unless we listen.” He rested his hand on Kaladin’s shoulder. “Your questions are honest, Kal. But you worry too much. We need to focus on the wall. Best not to talk too much about the queen, or the palace.”

“Like we don’t talk about Azure being a woman.”

“Her secret”—Beard winced—“I mean, the highmarshal’s secret is ours to guard and protect.”

“We do a storming poor job of that, then. Hopefully we’re better at defending the wall.”

Beard shrugged, hand still on Kaladin’s shoulder. For the first time, Kaladin noticed something. “No glyphward.”

Beard glanced at his arm, where he wore the traditional white armband that you’d tie a glyphward around. His was blank. “Yeah,” he said, shoving his hand in his coat pocket.

“Why not?” Kaladin said.

Beard shrugged. “Let’s just say, I know a lot about telling which stories have been made up. Nobody’s watching over us, Kal.”

He trudged off toward their muster station: one of the tower structures that lined the wall. Syl stood up on Kaladin’s shoulder, then walked up—as if on invisible steps—through the air to stand even with his eyes. She looked after Beard, her girlish dress rippling in wind that Kaladin couldn’t feel. “Dalinar thinks God isn’t dead,” she said. “Just that the Almighty—Honor—was never actually God.”

“You’re part of Honor. Doesn’t that offend you?”

“Every child eventually realizes that her father isn’t actually God.” She looked at him. “Do you think anybody is watching? Do you really think there isn’t anything out there?”

Strange question to answer, to a little bit of a divinity.

Kaladin lingered in the doorway to the guard tower. Inside, the men of his squad—Platoon Seven, Squad Two, which didn’t have the same ring to it as Bridge Four—laughed and banged about as they gathered equipment.

“I used to take the terrible things that had happened to me,” he said, “as proof that there was no god. Then in some of my darkest moments, I took my life as proof there must be something up there, for only intentional cruelty could offer an explanation.”

He took a deep breath, then looked toward the clouds. He had been delivered up to the sky, and had found magnificence there. He’d been given the power to protect and defend.

“Now,” he said. “Now I don’t know. With all due respect, I think Dalinar’s beliefs sound too convenient. Now that one deity has proven faulty, he insists the Almighty must never have been God? That there must be something else? I don’t like it. So … maybe this simply isn’t a question we can ever answer.”

He stepped into the fortification. It had broad doorways on either side leading in from the wall, while slits along the outward side provided archer positions, as did the roof. To his right stood racks of weapons and shields, and a table for mess. Above that, a large window looked out at the city beyond, where those inside could get specific orders via signal flags from below.

He was sliding his shield onto a rack when the drums sounded, calling the alarm. Syl zipped up behind him like string suddenly pulled taut.

“Assault on the wall!” Kaladin shouted, reading the drumbeats. “Equip up!” He scrambled across the room and seized a pike from the line on the wall. He tossed it to the first man who came, then continued distributing as the men scrambled to obey the signals. Lieutenant Noro and Beard handed out shields—rectangular full shields in contrast to the small round patrolling shields they’d carried below.