Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive #3)

“Give the excess to the children, please.”

“After all that haggling? You know I’d have donated some if you’d asked.”

“And miss the fun of negotiating?” Nohadon said. He borrowed the merchant’s pen, then crossed an item off his list. “There is satisfaction,” he said to Dalinar, “in creating a list of things you can actually accomplish, then removing them one at a time. As I said, a simple joy.”

“Unfortunately, I’m needed for bigger things than shopping.”

“Isn’t that always the problem? Tell me, my friend. You talk about your burdens and the difficulty of the decision. What is the cost of a principle?”

“The cost? There shouldn’t be a cost to being principled.”

“Oh? What if making the right decision created a spren who instantly blessed you with wealth, prosperity, and unending happiness? What then? Would you still have principles? Isn’t a principle about what you give up, not what you gain?”

“So it’s all negative?” Dalinar said. “Are you implying that nobody should have principles, because there’s no benefit to them?”

“Hardly,” Nohadon said. “But maybe you shouldn’t be looking for life to be easier because you choose to do something that is right! Personally, I think life is fair. It’s merely that often, you can’t immediately see what balances it.” He wagged the finger he’d used to tip the merchant’s scales. “If you’ll forgive a somewhat blatant metaphor. I’ve grown fond of them. You might say I wrote an entire book about them.”

“This … is different from the other visions,” Dalinar said. “What’s going on?”

The thumping from before returned. Dalinar spun, then charged out of the tent, determined to get a look at the thing. He saw it above the buildings, a stone creature with an angular face and red spots glowing deep in its rocky skull. Storms! And he had no weapon.

Nohadon stepped from the tent, holding his bag of grain. He looked up and smiled. The creature leaned down, then offered a large, skeletal hand. Nohadon touched it with its own, and the creature stilled.

“This is quite the nightmare you’ve created,” Nohadon said. “What does that thunderclast represent, I wonder?”

“Pain,” Dalinar said, backing away from the monster. “Tears. Burdens. I’m a lie, Nohadon. A hypocrite.”

“Sometimes, a hypocrite is nothing more than a man who is in the process of changing.”

Wait. Hadn’t Dalinar said that? Back when he’d felt stronger? More certain?

Other thumps sounded in the city. Hundreds of them. Creatures approaching from all sides, shadows in the sun.

“All things exist in three realms, Dalinar,” Nohadon said. “The Physical: what you are now. The Cognitive: what you see yourself as being. The Spiritual: the perfect you, the person beyond pain, and error, and uncertainty.”

Monsters of stone and horror surrounded him, heads cresting roofs, feet crushing buildings.

“You’ve said the oaths,” Nohadon called. “But do you understand the journey? Do you understand what it requires? You’ve forgotten one essential part, one thing that without which there can be no journey.”

The monsters slammed fists toward Dalinar, and he shouted.

“What is the most important step a man can take?”

Dalinar awoke, huddled in his bed in Urithiru, asleep in his clothing again. A mostly empty bottle of wine rested on the table. There was no storm. It hadn’t been a vision.

He buried his face in his hands, trembling. Something bloomed inside of him: a recollection. Not really a new memory—not one he’d completely forgotten. But it suddenly became as crisp as if he’d experienced it yesterday.

The night of Gavilar’s funeral.





Ashertmarn, the Heart of the Revel, is the final of the three great mindless Unmade. His gift to men is not prophecy or battle focus, but a lust for indulgence. Indeed, the great debauchery recorded from the court of Bayala in 480—which led to dynastic collapse—might be attributable to the influence of Ashertmarn.

—From Hessi’s Mythica, page 203

Navani Kholin had some practice holding a kingdom together.

During Gavilar’s last days, he had gone strange. Few knew how dark he’d grown, but they had seen the eccentricity. Jasnah had written about that, of course. Jasnah somehow found time to write about everything, from her father’s biography, to gender relations, to the importance of chull breeding cycles on the southern slopes of the Horneater Peaks.

Navani strode through the hallways of Urithiru, joined by a nice burly group of Bridge Four Windrunners. As Gavilar had grown more and more distracted, Navani herself had worked to keep squabbling lighteyes from sundering the kingdom. But that had been a different kind of danger from the one she faced today.

Today, her work had implications not only for one nation, but for the entire world. She burst into a room deep within the tower, and the four lighteyes seated there scrambled to their feet—all but Sebarial, who appeared to be flipping through a stack of cards bearing pictures of women in compromising positions.

Navani sighed, then nodded as Aladar gave her a respectful bow, light glinting off his bald head. Not for the first time, Navani wondered if his thin mustache and the tuft of beard on his bottom lip were compensation for his lack of hair. Hatham was there as well: refined, with rounded features and green eyes. As usual, his fashion choices stood out from everyone else. Orange today.

Brightness Bethab had come representing her husband. The men in the army tended to disrespect him for letting her do so—but that ignored the fact that marrying Mishinah for her political acumen had been a wise and calculated move.

The five men of Bridge Four arrayed themselves behind Navani. They had been surprised when she’d asked them to escort her; they didn’t yet understand the authority they lent the throne. The Knights Radiant were the new power in the world, and politics swirled around them like eddies in a river.

“Brightlords and Brightlady,” Navani said. “I’ve come at your request, and am at your service.”

Aladar cleared his throat, sitting. “You know, Brightness, that we are the most loyal to your husband’s cause.”

“Or at the least,” Sebarial added, “we’re the ones hoping to get rich by throwing in our lot with him.”

“My husband appreciates the support,” Navani said, “regardless of motive. You create a stronger Alethkar, and therefore a stronger world.”

“What’s left of either one,” Sebarial noted.

“Navani,” Brightlady Bethab said. She was a mousy woman with a pinched face. “We appreciate that you’ve taken the initiative in this difficult time.” There was a glint to her orange eyes, as if she assumed Navani was enjoying her new power. “But the highprince’s absence is not advantageous for morale. We know that Dalinar has returned to his … distractions.”

“The highprince,” Navani said, “is in mourning.”

“The only thing he seems to be mourning,” Sebarial said, “is the fact that people won’t bring him bottles of wine fast enough for—”