Oathbringer: Book Three of the Stormlight Archive

Brightness Kalami nodded, and Shallan tapped her lips with her drawing pencil. The question raised an implication. How could cities go completely dark? These days major cities—particularly ports—would have hundreds of spanreeds in operation. Every lighteyes or merchant wanting to watch prices or keep in contact with distant estates would have one.

Those in Kholinar had started working as soon as the highstorms returned—and then they’d been cut off one by one. Their last reports claimed that armies were gathering near the city. Then … nothing. The enemy seemed to be able to locate spanreeds somehow.

At least they’d finally gotten word from Kaladin. A single glyph for time, implying they should be patient. He’d been unable to get to a town to find a woman to scribe for him, and just wanted them to know he was safe. Assuming someone else hadn’t gotten the spanreed, and faked the glyph to put them off.

“The enemy is making a play for the Oathgates,” Dalinar decided. “All of their motions, save for the gathering in Marat, indicate this. My instincts say that army is planning to strike back at Azir, or even to cross and try to assault Jah Keved.”

“I trust Dalinar’s assessment,” Highprince Aladar added. “If he believes this course to be likely, we should listen.”

“Bah,” said Highprince Ruthar. The oily man leaned against the wall across from the others, barely paying attention. “Who cares what you say, Aladar? It’s amazing you can even see, considering the place you’ve gone and stuck your head these days.”

Aladar spun and thrust his hand to the side in a summoning posture. Dalinar stopped him, as Ruthar must have known that he would. Shallan shook her head, letting herself instead be drawn farther into her sketching. A few creationspren appeared at the top of her drawing pad, one a tiny shoe, the other a pencil like the one she used.

Her sketch was of Highprince Sadeas, drawn without a specific Memory. She’d never wanted to add him to her collection. She finished the quick sketch, then flipped to a sketch of Brightlord Perel, the other man they’d found dead in the hallways of Urithiru. She’d tried to re-create his face without wounds.

She flipped back and forth between the two. They do look similar, Shallan decided. Same bulbous features. Similar build. Her next two pages were pictures of the two Horneaters. Those two looked roughly similar as well. And the two murdered women? Why would the man who strangled his wife confess to that murder, but then swear he hadn’t killed the second woman? One was already enough to get you executed.

That spren is mimicking the violence, she thought. Killing or wounding in the same way as attacks from previous days. A kind of … impersonation?

Pattern hummed softly, drawing her attention. Shallan looked up to see someone strolling in her direction: a middle-aged woman with short black hair cut almost to the scalp. She wore a long skirt and a buttoning shirt with a vest. Thaylen merchant clothing.

“What is that you’re sketching, Brightness?” the woman asked in Veden.

Hearing her own language so suddenly was strange to Shallan, and her mind took a moment to sort through the words. “People,” Shallan said, closing her drawing pad. “I enjoy figure drawing. You’re the one who came with Taravangian. His Surgebinder.”

“Malata,” she said. “Though I am not his. I came to him for convenience, as Spark suggested we might look to Urithiru, now that it has been rediscovered.” She surveyed the large auditorium. Shallan could see no sign of her spren. “Do you suppose we really filled this entire chamber?”

“Ten orders,” Shallan said, “with hundreds of people in most. Yes, I’d assume we could fill it—in fact, I doubt everyone belonging to the orders could fit in here.”

“And now there are four of us,” she said idly, eyeing Renarin, who stood stiff beside his father, sweating beneath the scrutiny as people occasionally glanced at him.

“Five,” Shallan said. “There’s a flying bridgeman out there somewhere—and those are only the ones of us gathered here. There are bound to be others like you, who are still looking for a way to reach us.”

“If they want to,” Malata said. “Things don’t have to be the way they were. Why should they? It didn’t work out so well last time for the Radiants, did it?”

“Maybe,” Shallan said. “But maybe this isn’t the time to experiment either. The Desolation has started again. We could do worse than rely upon the past to survive this.”

“Curious,” the woman said, “that we have only the word of a few stuffy Alethi about this entire ‘Desolation’ business, eh sister?”

Shallan blinked at the casual way it was said, along with a wink. Malata smiled and sauntered back toward the front of the room.

“Well,” Shallan whispered, “she’s annoying.”

“Mmm…” Pattern said. “It will be worse when she starts destroying things.”

“Destroying?”

“Dustbringer,” Pattern said. “Her spren … mmm … they like to break what is around them. They want to know what is inside.”

“Pleasant,” Shallan said, as she flipped back through her drawings. The thing in the crack. The dead men. This should be enough to present to Dalinar and Adolin, which she planned to do today, now that she had her sketches done.

And after that?

I need to catch it, she thought. I watch the market. Eventually someone will be hurt. And a few days later, this thing will try to copy that attack.

Perhaps she could patrol the unexplored parts of the tower? Look for it, instead of waiting for it to attack?

The dark corridors. Each tunnel like a drawing’s impossible line …

The room had grown quiet. Shallan shook out of her reverie and looked up to see what was happening: Ialai Sadeas had arrived at the meeting, carried in a palanquin. She was accompanied by a familiar figure: Meridas Amaram was a tall man, tan eyed, with a square face and solid figure. He was also a murderer, a thief, and a traitor. He had been caught trying to steal a Shardblade—proof that what Captain Kaladin said about him was true.

Shallan gritted her teeth, but found her anger … cool. Not gone. No, she would not forgive this man for killing Helaran. But the uncomfortable truth was that she didn’t know why, or how, her brother had fallen to Amaram. She could almost hear Jasnah whispering to her: Don’t judge without more details.

Below, Adolin had risen and stepped toward Amaram, right into the center of the illusory map, breaking its surface, causing waves of glowing Stormlight to ripple across it. He stared murder at Amaram, though Dalinar rested his hand on his son’s shoulder, holding him back.

“Brightness Sadeas,” Dalinar said. “I am glad you have agreed to join the meeting. We could use your wisdom in our planning.”

“I’m not here for your plans, Dalinar,” Ialai said. “I’m here because it was a convenient place to find you all together. I’ve been in conference with my advisors back at our estates, and the consensus is that the heir, my nephew, is too young. This is no time for House Sadeas to be without leadership, so I’ve made a decision.”