Lithos Maitreya
Character Witness
- Location
- United States
In fairness, Taylor thought she was aro/ace for a good chunk of Ring-Maker. That's mostly because she's Bad At Feelings, though.
Of Many Colors [Stormlight Archive/Lord of the Rings]
- Thread starter Lithos Maitreya
- Start date
- Crossover
@Lithos Maitreya - Will Torol Sadeas meet his end sooner in this stories than in canon?
Lithos Maitreya
Character Witness
- Location
- United States
You can't possibly expect me to just tell you that, can you?
I believe the traditional response is "Read and find out!"
I am sorry for asking the question.
To answer your question, I do believe wholly able and capable of answering my question.
Yes, RAFO is the response that is dictated by tradition.
40: The Assassin in White
Lithos Maitreya
Character Witness
- Location
- United States
Thanks to Elran and @BeaconHill for betareading, and to Phinnia for the commissioned icon.
Over the next three millennia, my kind were hunted near to extinction. I, of course, knew little of this. For I had no contact with the outside world. I lived inside those caves, emerging only once every few decades when I could not find subterranean food to eat. No hoard had this dragon, save his own life.
Sarus felt the moment the highstorm struck the palace. It vibrated through the walls, whistled against the stone. A shuttered window began to rattle. In a chair by the door, Kaladin yawned, his head nodding onto his chest. The man had barely slept in weeks, it was true, but sleeping during the first gale of a highstorm was still impressive.
King Elhokar and Prince Adolin sat in two plush armchairs against one of the room's internal walls. There was a low table between them, on which rested two goblets of orange wine. Between sips, they chatted—Sarus would never risk accusing two of the most powerful men in Alethkar of gossiping—about their family and friends back in Kholinar.
They were in the king's quarters. Elhokar had taken to weathering highstorms here with his cousins, while the highprince and queen mother locked themselves in a side room.
Other than the Kholins, there were seven guards on duty. Only Sarus and Kaladin were welcome inside the room with the lighteyes. For Kaladin, it was because Dalinar trusted him. For Sarus, it was because he was in charge of Elhokar's personal guard and the king wanted to emulate his uncle. The other five stood guard outside.
Renarin sat in a corner, staring at nothing in particular. Sarus had gathered that he could speak to Glys without making any noise; he wondered if they were holding a conversation now.
He hadn't yet learned anything more about Glys since Archive had realized he wasn't an ordinary mistspren. Sarus didn't know how to probe Renarin about it. As difficult as the younger man found it to express his feelings and ideas, and as nervous as he often was about misinterpreting those of others, he wasn't easy to fool into letting something slip. He was constantly second-guessing any conversation he was a part of, which made it difficult to lull him into a sense of ease. Besides, Sarus simply hadn't had many opportunities to speak to him alone.
He wasn't sure what to make of it. Archive's memory was flawed, but she was confident she would be able to identify any of the ten types of spren who could bestow Surges and create Knights Radiant, and Sarus' description of Glys didn't match any of them. What that meant, neither of them were sure.
The king had received a letter from his wife, it seemed. Sarus noticed that there was no blossoming warmth in his face as he spoke of Queen Aesudan, unlike when his son, Gavinor, came up. A political marriage, most likely. Sarus wondered what Gavilar had won by selling out his son's future.
"Apparently there have been issues with the merchants making their way into Kholinar from the eastern farmlands," Elhokar was saying. "But Aesudan assures me that enough stores remain to last through the Weeping, if necessary."
"We don't want the capitol to have to dip into its siege stores, though," Adolin said, swirling his goblet thoughtfully. "If things go really poorly with Sadeas, we may need those."
"You really think it will come to war?" Sarus knew the sound of a man pretending to be nonchalant.
"I think Sadeas won't go down without some kind of fight," Adolin answered. "Not sure what sort of fight, but he's not going to fall in line without a struggle."
Elhokar looked pensive. After a particularly loud gust, he shot a glare at the leaky shutters. "I must remember to have that repaired later," he said. "It's been doing that every storm for weeks."
For a moment, Sarus entertained the idea that there might be some significance to leaking shutters. Someone had tried to assassinate the king by cutting the railing of his balcony, after all.
(Someone, as if Sarus didn't know exactly who had let a Shardbearer into Elhokar's study. He hadn't confronted Moash because he wasn't yet sure how the connections between the men of Bridge Four would play out once the man's duplicity was exposed. He needed to take control of the situation, or at least take stock, before he shot an arrow into the middle of it.)
Was it possible that a similar attempt might have been made using the windows? Perhaps someone had intended to expose Elhokar to the highstorm? But, no, he would have simply left the room once the storm broke in. If the wind somehow carried a boulder to this window, a hundred feet off the ground, the shutters wouldn't have stopped it anyway.
No, this was just a perfectly mundane case of poor maintenance.
"Did you tell Father about the Parshendi Shardbearer?" Renarin suddenly asked, looking over at Adolin across the room.
"Oh, yes, I did."
"What's this about a Parshendi Shardbearer?" Elhokar asked, looking between the brothers.
"Has Father not reported yet? I encountered the one he and I saw at the Tower," Adolin explained. "I suspect she's the last they have."
"She?" Elhokar's eyebrow rose.
"I think so," Adolin said. "It's hard to tell, with them."
"Hm." Elhokar sounded doubtful.
"Anyway," Adolin looked back at Renarin. "Father's agreed to meet with them. We're going to keep an eye out for their messenger. No sign of one yet."
Well. That was interesting. The Listeners had sent a Shardbearer to parley with Highprince Dalinar? There were implications there. Not least of which was that, to the Parshendi, the man with whom they needed to negotiate was not the king.
"They asked to speak with Uncle Dalinar?" Elhokar asked, and Sarus guessed by his tone that he hadn't missed the implication.
Adolin nodded. "No idea why, or why now. We'll update you the moment we do."
"Good." Elhokar stood up, straightening his clothes. He wore a much more ornate version of the Kholin blue uniform favored by Dalinar and his sons, embroidered with the Kholin glyphpair over his breast and decorated with buttons of solid gold. "I'll be back shortly," he said. "The privy calls." He crossed to a side door and entered, shutting and locking it behind him.
"You're sure meeting with them is a good idea?" Renarin asked.
"It's not my decision," Adolin pointed out. "It's Father's."
"And do you think he's making the right decision?"
Adolin hesitated. "I think so," he said. "Nothing may come of it, of course. They may even try to betray us again, just like they did five years ago. But we won't be taken by surprise again. I'm glad Father agreed. It's a chance to end this war without spending another five years out here trying to reach the center of the Plains one plateau at a time."
"And the Shardbearer," Renarin said. "You really think she was a woman?"
As he spoke, Sarus saw Kaladin jerk suddenly to wakefulness by the door. Sarus shot him a look. Kaladin's eyes were wide, and his face was pale. He looked around the room frantically.
"They usually have beards. She didn't, and I didn't see any stubble either. Her voice might have been feminine? It was deeper than most women I've known, but maybe that's normal for the Parshendi. They're odd." Adolin glanced over at Kaladin, his lips turning upward in amusement. "Sleeping on the job, soldier?"
Kaladin didn't answer, just looked at Sarus. "Where…"
"His Majesty is in the privy," said Sarus smoothly. "Is something wrong?"
He remembered Kaladin's strange dream in the bridgeman barracks, a few weeks before they had been freed. He had seen cities, depicted as they really were, though he had never even heard them described before. There had been a highstorm that night, too. Had he just suffered another, similar vision?
"You can sleep during a highstorm," Adolin observed. "Impressive. You can also drool during a highstorm, which is less so."
Kaladin ignored the prince. Sarus realized he was breathing quickly, almost panicking. He crossed to the window and, without hesitating for even a moment, flung it open.
Adolin shouted in alarm. "Are you out of your mind?"
"Kaladin," Sarus said quietly, stepping up beside his captain. "You saw something?"
At that moment, Syl darted inside, flying out of the storm like a falling star. She tended to stay outside during highstorms. "Something's wrong, Kaladin," she said. She sounded… afraid.
The last time Sarus had heard that tone in her voice, Kaladin had been dying in the bridgemen barracks.
"I know," Kaladin said hoarsely.
"He's coming," Syl moaned.
"Who?"
"Odium," Syl whispered. "Not in person, not yet. But he's watching. I can feel it."
"Damnation," whispered Archive on Sarus' shoulder, too quiet for the Kholins to hear.
For a long moment, Sarus and Kaladin stood their ground, the rain pelting their faces. Then Kaladin flung the shutters closed and turned back to the princes. "Get the king," he ordered. "We're leaving. Now."
"What do you mean, we're leaving?" Adolin demanded.
Renarin stood up. He caught Sarus' gaze for a long moment. Whatever he saw there, it was enough to make him touch his brother's arm. "Listen to them," he said.
"Renarin—"
"Please."
Adolin looked down at his brother, blinking. Then his jaw set. "Fine."
Even as they spoke, Kaladin was crossing to the door that led to the side room where Dalinar and Navani were cloistered. Adolin had just turned to look at him when he flung it open. Then he paused, as if surprised at what he saw.
Sarus followed his gaze, and was also surprised. He had practically expected both elderly lighteyes to be either nearly or entirely unclothed. Instead, Dalinar sat on a sofa, his eyes glazed over, his expression thoughtful. He spoke softly to Navani, whose safehand sleeve was covering his hand while her freehand wrote busily on a pad. Whatever language he was speaking, it wasn't Alethi.
Navani spun to glare at Kaladin. "What is this? How dare you?"
"Can you wake him?" Kaladin asked. "We need to leave. Get out of this room—out of the palace."
"Leave the palace?" Elhokar asked, emerging from the privy. "What nonsense is this? It's the middle of a highstorm!"
"Your Majesty," Sarus said, bowing. "Captain Kaladin believes that our position here is compromised. His instincts on these things are usually good."
"Even when they're based on dreams?" Adolin asked. "This is the safest place in the warcamps. You want to drag the king out into a highstorm?"
Kaladin continued to ignore him. "We need to wake the highprince."
"The highprince," said Dalinar, eyes suddenly clearing, "is awake. What is happening?"
"The bridgemen want us to evacuate the palace," Adolin said.
Dalinar looked at Kaladin. "Soldier?"
"It's not safe here, sir." Kaladin's expression was pinched. He knew he had no evidence he could share, and he knew it was vital that they flee.
Sarus cast about. How could he maneuver this? How could he seize control of this conversation and turn the wheel where they needed to go?
"How do you know this?" Dalinar asked Kaladin.
"Instinct, sir."
The highstorm was abating. In the pause before Dalinar answered, Sarus heard the stormwall pass over them, giving way to the riddens.
"We go, then," said Dalinar at last, standing.
"What?" Elhokar demanded.
"Your Majesty," Sarus said. "I do not fully understand Captain Kaladin's reasoning myself. But I ask you—would you rather go out with him, six other guards, and the rest of your family, which includes two Shardbearers? Or would you prefer to remain here with only me and perhaps three other men to defend you? The storm has passed. We will be safe."
Elhokar looked at him, blinking. Then he nodded. "Very well. Lead the way."
Kaladin was already throwing the door to the corridor open. "Evenk, Delp, you're an advance squad," he ordered. "Scout the way out of the building, see if there's a clear path through the kitchens. Moash, Ralinor, you're the rearguard. Watch this room until I've got the king and highprince out of sight, then follow. Torfin, you're with Sarus. Both of you, stick with the king, no matter what happens."
All five men saluted and jumped to obey. As they moved, Sarus swore under his breath. Kaladin had just given Moash access to Elhokar's chambers, nearly unmonitored. Sarus would have to ensure that he hadn't made another ridiculous assassination attempt whenever they finished here.
They all followed Kaladin out of the room as Evenk and Delp rushed ahead. Dalinar hurried ahead to be abreast of the captain. "I'll be curious to hear exactly what prompted this later, Captain," he said. Sarus privately promised to come up with an excuse for Kaladin to use before it became necessary.
They descended a stairwell, then rounded a corner, and Kaladin froze. Sarus saw why at once. The corridor ahead was shrouded in darkness.
"What happened to the lights?" Adolin asked, peering into the shroud.
Sarus stepped up beside Kaladin, because he knew. The spherelamps ahead had been drained of Stormlight. Silently, he and Kaladin traded sphere pouches. Then he took one of the Stormlight-infused spheres out of the pouch he'd just taken from the captain and held it aloft.
The light revealed two things. The first was that a square hole had been cut in the palace wall, letting the wind blow in. The second was that there were two corpses on the ground. Evenk and Delp. Delp was face down, but Evenk's face was turned upward. His eyes had been burned out.
A Shardbearer.
Then a man stepped out of the opening, and Sarus amended his horrified realization. Not just a Shardbearer.
The Assassin in White. The man who had killed King Gavilar.
He wore flowing garments, though they clung to his rain-soaked skin. His head was bald, and his eyes were strangely bulbous in the way characteristic of the Shin. In his right hand he carried a Shardblade, long and silvery. He dragged it behind him, cutting a clean furrow in the stone floor. He turned to face them, then fell perfectly still. Stormlight was streaming from his body.
The Assassin in White was a Surgebinder. A Radiant.
Dalinar leapt into action first. "Adolin, with me! Renarin, defend the king! Take him back the way we came!" Then he reached out, grabbed the spear out of Torfin's hand, and charged the assassin.
"All of you, go with the king!" Kaladin roared, then rushed after him.
For a long moment, Sarus hesitated. He had been assigned to lead Elhokar's guard. Kaladin had ordered him to follow the king. That was his responsibility. He was good with a spear, but not as good as Kaladin. What could he possibly do here, anyway? It didn't make sense to stay.
He let out a breath, then handed his spear to Torfin. "Go," he ordered. "Defend His Majesty." Then he turned and followed his captain, picking up Evenk's fallen spear as he went.
The other three men had slowed by the time Sarus caught up to them, slowly approaching the assassin. "I told you to go, Sarus," Kaladin said quietly.
"Have me court-martialed later."
"Trident formation," Dalinar commanded, cutting off their quiet bickering. "Sarus and I in the center. Adolin and Kaladin on the flanks. Understood?"
"Understood," said Kaladin.
They reorganized, Dalinar glaring at the assassin. "I'm not asleep at the table this time. You're not taking anyone else from me, bastard!"
He charged, the rest of them half a step behind. The trident was a simple formation—the central prong kept the focus of the enemy while the sides attempted to flank and do the real damage.
Unfortunately, it had not been designed to fight Surgebinders. The man leapt, white clothes flapping around him, and then kept rising. No—falling, upward towards the ceiling. Then he reoriented, running down the wall towards Adolin. Out of the corner of his eye, Sarus could see Kaladin breath in sharply. He was glowing just slightly, nearly invisible compared with the assassin.
But though they were carrying different amounts of Stormlight, they had at least one Surge in common. That had unmistakably been Gravitation. He leapt at Adolin, striking the prince's Shardblade with his own to bat it aside, then reached out and touched the man's chest. Adolin yelped as the Surge of Gravitation took hold on him and he began to fall, flipping as he did, rising up towards the ceiling and striking with a crash. Sarus saw him roll back to his feet, but he was stuck up there.
And the rest of them were stuck down here.
They struck, all three of them at once, with their spears. The assassin let them strike true. He didn't even try to dodge. All three weapons embedded in his flesh. After a pause, as if he was waiting to make sure they had time to take in what they were seeing, he spun, sweeping his blade through all three spears, bisecting all of them. Then he dealt Dalinar a heavy blow with the back of his hand, sending the man sprawling. As he struggled to rise, the assassin stepped back, and Sarus watched the Stormlight weaving his torn flesh back together.
"Stand aside, both of you." The assassin's voice was soft, and Stormlight trailed from his lips as he spoke. "I don't have to kill you."
Sarus grabbed the other half of his broken spear in his offhand and moved to stand beside Kaladin. "What a coincidence," he said. "We don't intend to die."
The man let out a soft breath. "A shame."
Then he charged at them. They both had to duck to avoid his first sweeping strike, then they split, each striking towards one of his flanks.
Against an ordinary enemy, that maneuver might have worked. But even before his spear struck true, Sarus realized their mistake. The Assassin in White had limited Stormlight. He couldn't afford to turn this into a battle of attrition. He could afford to shrug off one blow. He couldn't afford to sustain a dozen.
The only sensible thing for the man to do was exactly what he did. Rather than be driven back by two attackers, allow them both to get a single blow in…
…and then kill one of them to make sure he didn't get a second.
Sarus realized all this just in time for his eyes to widen as the silvery Blade passed straight through his chest.
Pain filled his world. His vision went white. His eyes began to burn—he could feel them burning, could feel the smoke rising from them. He was being torn apart, severed from himself.
But then his vision cleared. His eyes, still smoking, looked into a completely different room. He could see the Blade in his chest, long and silver, and he thought he could see the faint outline of the hand holding its hilt, but it faded to nothing before he could see past its wrist.
Eyes watering, teeth gritted against the agony, he looked past the sword at the room around him. Glowing panes of glass stood upon exposed surfaces. A strange machine whirred in one corner, spindly arms of metal moving and sparking as they assembled something from a silvery substance.
There was a window in the room. Outside, he saw a city of massive, blocky stones, as if people had turned all the spires of the eastern Shattered Plains into homes to live in. The city overlooked a tranquil ocean, glittering with reflected sunlight. The sky overhead was pale blue. Within it, hanging in the air like decorations on the wall were a fleet of ships, their hulls built of white wood and silver metal, their sails shimmering like spun gold.
There were two people in the room. One was a man with pointed ears, dressed in workmanlike clothes of green and silver. His long, dark hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and he was smiling as he said something to the other occupant of the room.
She was a woman—no, a girl of no more than fifteen or sixteen years—wearing a form-fitting jumpsuit of a thick black fabric. In her hand was an ornate, silver-white hammer, and she stood beside an anvil, holding something metal into a nearby forge.
"—hammering wooden hulls together by hand, most likely," the man was saying, laughter in his voice.
The girl laughed too. Her voice was beautiful—musical, and yet strangely dissonant, in a way that was as fascinating as it was unsettling. Then she paused and turned to face him. Her eyes widened as she saw him.
He felt as if he knew her somehow.
She reached out a hand towards him. Her mouth opened. "Cu—"
The sword in his chest detonated. It shattered into more than a dozen glittering fragments. His vision went white again as the pain suddenly blossomed into something truly unbearable. Then everything went black, and he was gone.
-x-x-x-
40
The Assassin in White
-x-x-x-
40
The Assassin in White
-x-x-x-
Over the next three millennia, my kind were hunted near to extinction. I, of course, knew little of this. For I had no contact with the outside world. I lived inside those caves, emerging only once every few decades when I could not find subterranean food to eat. No hoard had this dragon, save his own life.
-x-x-x-
Sarus felt the moment the highstorm struck the palace. It vibrated through the walls, whistled against the stone. A shuttered window began to rattle. In a chair by the door, Kaladin yawned, his head nodding onto his chest. The man had barely slept in weeks, it was true, but sleeping during the first gale of a highstorm was still impressive.
King Elhokar and Prince Adolin sat in two plush armchairs against one of the room's internal walls. There was a low table between them, on which rested two goblets of orange wine. Between sips, they chatted—Sarus would never risk accusing two of the most powerful men in Alethkar of gossiping—about their family and friends back in Kholinar.
They were in the king's quarters. Elhokar had taken to weathering highstorms here with his cousins, while the highprince and queen mother locked themselves in a side room.
Other than the Kholins, there were seven guards on duty. Only Sarus and Kaladin were welcome inside the room with the lighteyes. For Kaladin, it was because Dalinar trusted him. For Sarus, it was because he was in charge of Elhokar's personal guard and the king wanted to emulate his uncle. The other five stood guard outside.
Renarin sat in a corner, staring at nothing in particular. Sarus had gathered that he could speak to Glys without making any noise; he wondered if they were holding a conversation now.
He hadn't yet learned anything more about Glys since Archive had realized he wasn't an ordinary mistspren. Sarus didn't know how to probe Renarin about it. As difficult as the younger man found it to express his feelings and ideas, and as nervous as he often was about misinterpreting those of others, he wasn't easy to fool into letting something slip. He was constantly second-guessing any conversation he was a part of, which made it difficult to lull him into a sense of ease. Besides, Sarus simply hadn't had many opportunities to speak to him alone.
He wasn't sure what to make of it. Archive's memory was flawed, but she was confident she would be able to identify any of the ten types of spren who could bestow Surges and create Knights Radiant, and Sarus' description of Glys didn't match any of them. What that meant, neither of them were sure.
The king had received a letter from his wife, it seemed. Sarus noticed that there was no blossoming warmth in his face as he spoke of Queen Aesudan, unlike when his son, Gavinor, came up. A political marriage, most likely. Sarus wondered what Gavilar had won by selling out his son's future.
"Apparently there have been issues with the merchants making their way into Kholinar from the eastern farmlands," Elhokar was saying. "But Aesudan assures me that enough stores remain to last through the Weeping, if necessary."
"We don't want the capitol to have to dip into its siege stores, though," Adolin said, swirling his goblet thoughtfully. "If things go really poorly with Sadeas, we may need those."
"You really think it will come to war?" Sarus knew the sound of a man pretending to be nonchalant.
"I think Sadeas won't go down without some kind of fight," Adolin answered. "Not sure what sort of fight, but he's not going to fall in line without a struggle."
Elhokar looked pensive. After a particularly loud gust, he shot a glare at the leaky shutters. "I must remember to have that repaired later," he said. "It's been doing that every storm for weeks."
For a moment, Sarus entertained the idea that there might be some significance to leaking shutters. Someone had tried to assassinate the king by cutting the railing of his balcony, after all.
(Someone, as if Sarus didn't know exactly who had let a Shardbearer into Elhokar's study. He hadn't confronted Moash because he wasn't yet sure how the connections between the men of Bridge Four would play out once the man's duplicity was exposed. He needed to take control of the situation, or at least take stock, before he shot an arrow into the middle of it.)
Was it possible that a similar attempt might have been made using the windows? Perhaps someone had intended to expose Elhokar to the highstorm? But, no, he would have simply left the room once the storm broke in. If the wind somehow carried a boulder to this window, a hundred feet off the ground, the shutters wouldn't have stopped it anyway.
No, this was just a perfectly mundane case of poor maintenance.
"Did you tell Father about the Parshendi Shardbearer?" Renarin suddenly asked, looking over at Adolin across the room.
"Oh, yes, I did."
"What's this about a Parshendi Shardbearer?" Elhokar asked, looking between the brothers.
"Has Father not reported yet? I encountered the one he and I saw at the Tower," Adolin explained. "I suspect she's the last they have."
"She?" Elhokar's eyebrow rose.
"I think so," Adolin said. "It's hard to tell, with them."
"Hm." Elhokar sounded doubtful.
"Anyway," Adolin looked back at Renarin. "Father's agreed to meet with them. We're going to keep an eye out for their messenger. No sign of one yet."
Well. That was interesting. The Listeners had sent a Shardbearer to parley with Highprince Dalinar? There were implications there. Not least of which was that, to the Parshendi, the man with whom they needed to negotiate was not the king.
"They asked to speak with Uncle Dalinar?" Elhokar asked, and Sarus guessed by his tone that he hadn't missed the implication.
Adolin nodded. "No idea why, or why now. We'll update you the moment we do."
"Good." Elhokar stood up, straightening his clothes. He wore a much more ornate version of the Kholin blue uniform favored by Dalinar and his sons, embroidered with the Kholin glyphpair over his breast and decorated with buttons of solid gold. "I'll be back shortly," he said. "The privy calls." He crossed to a side door and entered, shutting and locking it behind him.
"You're sure meeting with them is a good idea?" Renarin asked.
"It's not my decision," Adolin pointed out. "It's Father's."
"And do you think he's making the right decision?"
Adolin hesitated. "I think so," he said. "Nothing may come of it, of course. They may even try to betray us again, just like they did five years ago. But we won't be taken by surprise again. I'm glad Father agreed. It's a chance to end this war without spending another five years out here trying to reach the center of the Plains one plateau at a time."
"And the Shardbearer," Renarin said. "You really think she was a woman?"
As he spoke, Sarus saw Kaladin jerk suddenly to wakefulness by the door. Sarus shot him a look. Kaladin's eyes were wide, and his face was pale. He looked around the room frantically.
"They usually have beards. She didn't, and I didn't see any stubble either. Her voice might have been feminine? It was deeper than most women I've known, but maybe that's normal for the Parshendi. They're odd." Adolin glanced over at Kaladin, his lips turning upward in amusement. "Sleeping on the job, soldier?"
Kaladin didn't answer, just looked at Sarus. "Where…"
"His Majesty is in the privy," said Sarus smoothly. "Is something wrong?"
He remembered Kaladin's strange dream in the bridgeman barracks, a few weeks before they had been freed. He had seen cities, depicted as they really were, though he had never even heard them described before. There had been a highstorm that night, too. Had he just suffered another, similar vision?
"You can sleep during a highstorm," Adolin observed. "Impressive. You can also drool during a highstorm, which is less so."
Kaladin ignored the prince. Sarus realized he was breathing quickly, almost panicking. He crossed to the window and, without hesitating for even a moment, flung it open.
Adolin shouted in alarm. "Are you out of your mind?"
"Kaladin," Sarus said quietly, stepping up beside his captain. "You saw something?"
At that moment, Syl darted inside, flying out of the storm like a falling star. She tended to stay outside during highstorms. "Something's wrong, Kaladin," she said. She sounded… afraid.
The last time Sarus had heard that tone in her voice, Kaladin had been dying in the bridgemen barracks.
"I know," Kaladin said hoarsely.
"He's coming," Syl moaned.
"Who?"
"Odium," Syl whispered. "Not in person, not yet. But he's watching. I can feel it."
"Damnation," whispered Archive on Sarus' shoulder, too quiet for the Kholins to hear.
For a long moment, Sarus and Kaladin stood their ground, the rain pelting their faces. Then Kaladin flung the shutters closed and turned back to the princes. "Get the king," he ordered. "We're leaving. Now."
"What do you mean, we're leaving?" Adolin demanded.
Renarin stood up. He caught Sarus' gaze for a long moment. Whatever he saw there, it was enough to make him touch his brother's arm. "Listen to them," he said.
"Renarin—"
"Please."
Adolin looked down at his brother, blinking. Then his jaw set. "Fine."
Even as they spoke, Kaladin was crossing to the door that led to the side room where Dalinar and Navani were cloistered. Adolin had just turned to look at him when he flung it open. Then he paused, as if surprised at what he saw.
Sarus followed his gaze, and was also surprised. He had practically expected both elderly lighteyes to be either nearly or entirely unclothed. Instead, Dalinar sat on a sofa, his eyes glazed over, his expression thoughtful. He spoke softly to Navani, whose safehand sleeve was covering his hand while her freehand wrote busily on a pad. Whatever language he was speaking, it wasn't Alethi.
Navani spun to glare at Kaladin. "What is this? How dare you?"
"Can you wake him?" Kaladin asked. "We need to leave. Get out of this room—out of the palace."
"Leave the palace?" Elhokar asked, emerging from the privy. "What nonsense is this? It's the middle of a highstorm!"
"Your Majesty," Sarus said, bowing. "Captain Kaladin believes that our position here is compromised. His instincts on these things are usually good."
"Even when they're based on dreams?" Adolin asked. "This is the safest place in the warcamps. You want to drag the king out into a highstorm?"
Kaladin continued to ignore him. "We need to wake the highprince."
"The highprince," said Dalinar, eyes suddenly clearing, "is awake. What is happening?"
"The bridgemen want us to evacuate the palace," Adolin said.
Dalinar looked at Kaladin. "Soldier?"
"It's not safe here, sir." Kaladin's expression was pinched. He knew he had no evidence he could share, and he knew it was vital that they flee.
Sarus cast about. How could he maneuver this? How could he seize control of this conversation and turn the wheel where they needed to go?
"How do you know this?" Dalinar asked Kaladin.
"Instinct, sir."
The highstorm was abating. In the pause before Dalinar answered, Sarus heard the stormwall pass over them, giving way to the riddens.
"We go, then," said Dalinar at last, standing.
"What?" Elhokar demanded.
"Your Majesty," Sarus said. "I do not fully understand Captain Kaladin's reasoning myself. But I ask you—would you rather go out with him, six other guards, and the rest of your family, which includes two Shardbearers? Or would you prefer to remain here with only me and perhaps three other men to defend you? The storm has passed. We will be safe."
Elhokar looked at him, blinking. Then he nodded. "Very well. Lead the way."
Kaladin was already throwing the door to the corridor open. "Evenk, Delp, you're an advance squad," he ordered. "Scout the way out of the building, see if there's a clear path through the kitchens. Moash, Ralinor, you're the rearguard. Watch this room until I've got the king and highprince out of sight, then follow. Torfin, you're with Sarus. Both of you, stick with the king, no matter what happens."
All five men saluted and jumped to obey. As they moved, Sarus swore under his breath. Kaladin had just given Moash access to Elhokar's chambers, nearly unmonitored. Sarus would have to ensure that he hadn't made another ridiculous assassination attempt whenever they finished here.
They all followed Kaladin out of the room as Evenk and Delp rushed ahead. Dalinar hurried ahead to be abreast of the captain. "I'll be curious to hear exactly what prompted this later, Captain," he said. Sarus privately promised to come up with an excuse for Kaladin to use before it became necessary.
They descended a stairwell, then rounded a corner, and Kaladin froze. Sarus saw why at once. The corridor ahead was shrouded in darkness.
"What happened to the lights?" Adolin asked, peering into the shroud.
Sarus stepped up beside Kaladin, because he knew. The spherelamps ahead had been drained of Stormlight. Silently, he and Kaladin traded sphere pouches. Then he took one of the Stormlight-infused spheres out of the pouch he'd just taken from the captain and held it aloft.
The light revealed two things. The first was that a square hole had been cut in the palace wall, letting the wind blow in. The second was that there were two corpses on the ground. Evenk and Delp. Delp was face down, but Evenk's face was turned upward. His eyes had been burned out.
A Shardbearer.
Then a man stepped out of the opening, and Sarus amended his horrified realization. Not just a Shardbearer.
The Assassin in White. The man who had killed King Gavilar.
He wore flowing garments, though they clung to his rain-soaked skin. His head was bald, and his eyes were strangely bulbous in the way characteristic of the Shin. In his right hand he carried a Shardblade, long and silvery. He dragged it behind him, cutting a clean furrow in the stone floor. He turned to face them, then fell perfectly still. Stormlight was streaming from his body.
The Assassin in White was a Surgebinder. A Radiant.
Dalinar leapt into action first. "Adolin, with me! Renarin, defend the king! Take him back the way we came!" Then he reached out, grabbed the spear out of Torfin's hand, and charged the assassin.
"All of you, go with the king!" Kaladin roared, then rushed after him.
For a long moment, Sarus hesitated. He had been assigned to lead Elhokar's guard. Kaladin had ordered him to follow the king. That was his responsibility. He was good with a spear, but not as good as Kaladin. What could he possibly do here, anyway? It didn't make sense to stay.
He let out a breath, then handed his spear to Torfin. "Go," he ordered. "Defend His Majesty." Then he turned and followed his captain, picking up Evenk's fallen spear as he went.
The other three men had slowed by the time Sarus caught up to them, slowly approaching the assassin. "I told you to go, Sarus," Kaladin said quietly.
"Have me court-martialed later."
"Trident formation," Dalinar commanded, cutting off their quiet bickering. "Sarus and I in the center. Adolin and Kaladin on the flanks. Understood?"
"Understood," said Kaladin.
They reorganized, Dalinar glaring at the assassin. "I'm not asleep at the table this time. You're not taking anyone else from me, bastard!"
He charged, the rest of them half a step behind. The trident was a simple formation—the central prong kept the focus of the enemy while the sides attempted to flank and do the real damage.
Unfortunately, it had not been designed to fight Surgebinders. The man leapt, white clothes flapping around him, and then kept rising. No—falling, upward towards the ceiling. Then he reoriented, running down the wall towards Adolin. Out of the corner of his eye, Sarus could see Kaladin breath in sharply. He was glowing just slightly, nearly invisible compared with the assassin.
But though they were carrying different amounts of Stormlight, they had at least one Surge in common. That had unmistakably been Gravitation. He leapt at Adolin, striking the prince's Shardblade with his own to bat it aside, then reached out and touched the man's chest. Adolin yelped as the Surge of Gravitation took hold on him and he began to fall, flipping as he did, rising up towards the ceiling and striking with a crash. Sarus saw him roll back to his feet, but he was stuck up there.
And the rest of them were stuck down here.
They struck, all three of them at once, with their spears. The assassin let them strike true. He didn't even try to dodge. All three weapons embedded in his flesh. After a pause, as if he was waiting to make sure they had time to take in what they were seeing, he spun, sweeping his blade through all three spears, bisecting all of them. Then he dealt Dalinar a heavy blow with the back of his hand, sending the man sprawling. As he struggled to rise, the assassin stepped back, and Sarus watched the Stormlight weaving his torn flesh back together.
"Stand aside, both of you." The assassin's voice was soft, and Stormlight trailed from his lips as he spoke. "I don't have to kill you."
Sarus grabbed the other half of his broken spear in his offhand and moved to stand beside Kaladin. "What a coincidence," he said. "We don't intend to die."
The man let out a soft breath. "A shame."
Then he charged at them. They both had to duck to avoid his first sweeping strike, then they split, each striking towards one of his flanks.
Against an ordinary enemy, that maneuver might have worked. But even before his spear struck true, Sarus realized their mistake. The Assassin in White had limited Stormlight. He couldn't afford to turn this into a battle of attrition. He could afford to shrug off one blow. He couldn't afford to sustain a dozen.
The only sensible thing for the man to do was exactly what he did. Rather than be driven back by two attackers, allow them both to get a single blow in…
…and then kill one of them to make sure he didn't get a second.
Sarus realized all this just in time for his eyes to widen as the silvery Blade passed straight through his chest.
Pain filled his world. His vision went white. His eyes began to burn—he could feel them burning, could feel the smoke rising from them. He was being torn apart, severed from himself.
But then his vision cleared. His eyes, still smoking, looked into a completely different room. He could see the Blade in his chest, long and silver, and he thought he could see the faint outline of the hand holding its hilt, but it faded to nothing before he could see past its wrist.
Eyes watering, teeth gritted against the agony, he looked past the sword at the room around him. Glowing panes of glass stood upon exposed surfaces. A strange machine whirred in one corner, spindly arms of metal moving and sparking as they assembled something from a silvery substance.
There was a window in the room. Outside, he saw a city of massive, blocky stones, as if people had turned all the spires of the eastern Shattered Plains into homes to live in. The city overlooked a tranquil ocean, glittering with reflected sunlight. The sky overhead was pale blue. Within it, hanging in the air like decorations on the wall were a fleet of ships, their hulls built of white wood and silver metal, their sails shimmering like spun gold.
There were two people in the room. One was a man with pointed ears, dressed in workmanlike clothes of green and silver. His long, dark hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and he was smiling as he said something to the other occupant of the room.
She was a woman—no, a girl of no more than fifteen or sixteen years—wearing a form-fitting jumpsuit of a thick black fabric. In her hand was an ornate, silver-white hammer, and she stood beside an anvil, holding something metal into a nearby forge.
"—hammering wooden hulls together by hand, most likely," the man was saying, laughter in his voice.
The girl laughed too. Her voice was beautiful—musical, and yet strangely dissonant, in a way that was as fascinating as it was unsettling. Then she paused and turned to face him. Her eyes widened as she saw him.
He felt as if he knew her somehow.
She reached out a hand towards him. Her mouth opened. "Cu—"
The sword in his chest detonated. It shattered into more than a dozen glittering fragments. His vision went white again as the pain suddenly blossomed into something truly unbearable. Then everything went black, and he was gone.
Namer
ᵘʷᵘ
- Location
- Bangladesh
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Ooh. I read the last third of Ring Maker for the first time only a few weeks ago, so this scene is still crisp and clear. Was wondering when it would show up.
wait
Oh dear...
wait
Oh dear...
Chloe Sullivan
Subdefective
- Location
- 1630 Revello Drive, Sunnydale CA
Welp, there goes canon.
I don't think that was the cognitive realm, but that was somewhere. And someone who knows the name Cururmo
I don't think that was the cognitive realm, but that was somewhere. And someone who knows the name Cururmo
Lithos Maitreya
Character Witness
- Location
- United States
This scene is the other side of one which occured in the fourth epilogue of Ring-Maker. While Sarus will be trying to figure out what exactly he saw for some time, you are allowed to know that it was Earth Bet.
- Location
- Mexico
YES, FINALLY. We move from canon and now we get to the story. I can't wait to see how everything change and how utterly epic this transform.
Is Sarus dead?
Is the scene prior to the sword going bang about Taylor making the Rings or have the elves been found and I missed it?
Lithos Maitreya
Character Witness
- Location
- United States
Sarus will survive this, but he is heavily weakened. The vision is Sarus' side of Constellation E.4 in Ring-Maker.
Thank you for letting me know. I am curious as how Kaladin and the other men will respond to Sarus weakness.
I will have to reread Constellation E.4 in Ring-Maker. It should interesting with thhe new information you have provided here.
Oh, and here I thought the girl in last chapter was actually the missing Sadeas daughter. She's probably in shadesmar, (My pet theory is that she's not dead and was actually a Willshaper, that felt trapped about her lot in life and blundered herself into shadesmar).
Last edited:
41: Of Honor
Lithos Maitreya
Character Witness
- Location
- United States
Thanks to Elran and @BeaconHill for betareading, and to Phinnia for the commissioned icon.
The few times I was happened upon by a roving band of orcs or an adventurer from Rhûn, I killed them or fled to a different mountain. What choice did I have? For if any found me and reported my location to their people, I was sure that I would be hunted and killed.
Rlain didn't worry when the highstorm passed over the barrack. It was just one more storm. There was nothing unusual about it. Certainly, he longed to go out into it and try to attract a spren, to escape the shell of dullform that left his mind and body sluggish. But he resisted that temptation, just as he always did.
Kaladin and Sarus were both away watching the king and highprince this storm. He didn't worry about that either. With Sarus in charge of the king's guard rotations, and Kaladin in charge of the highprince's, highstorms usually required the both of them. Moash was there, too. That was all three of Bridge Four's best spearmen.
Rlain didn't expect them to need those skills in the middle of a storm. But if they did, it wouldn't have occurred to him to worry that they might be insufficient.
He didn't worry when the riddens gave way to a clearing sky. Nomon shone brilliant blue overhead, the color of a windspren's soft glow illuminating the world. The storm had come near the start of the night shift today, so Sarus and Kaladin would both still be on duty for a few more hours.
He did start to worry when he woke up to help Rock cook breakfast, several hours later, and they still hadn't returned. It wasn't the first time a guard shift had been irregular for one reason or another. Everything was probably fine. But it was a sign that maybe, just maybe, something was wrong.
Rock shot Rlain a look when he cut himself chopping sweet vinebuds for the porridge. "You are worried," the big Horneater observed.
Rlain didn't answer. Both because he had to avoid rousing suspicion that he was more independent-minded than a parshman, and because his dullform brain couldn't come up with anything to say.
"I am worried too," Rock confided. "Morning shift left to relieve the night shift more than an hour ago. Kaladin and the others should have been back by now."
Rlain nodded. They continued working in silence, soon joined by Lopen. The one-armed Herdazian's chatter soothed Rlain's concerns. Everything was fine. Kaladin and Sarus had probably been held up by some unexpected need for more guards. Maybe a plateau run had been called at night—that didn't normally happen, but it wasn't unheard of—and they'd needed to go out onto the Plains to defend Prince Renarin and Highprince Dalinar. Or maybe something had caused the Kholin family to split up completely, requiring both first and second shift to combine to defend all of them. There were any number of reasons why they wouldn't have returned promptly. Such things happened. There was no cause for concern.
But then the minutes stretched into an hour. Into two. And Rlain could no longer tell himself that there was no cause for worry.
"All right," said Murk sharply, standing suddenly from the hand of cards he'd been playing with Rock, Gadol, Eth, and Mart. "My squad, grab your gear. We're going to see what's happening."
Several men leapt to their feet and started towards the racks near the front of the room, where their spears were waiting for them. And suddenly, the same impulse that had driven Rlain to ask Kaladin for a spear spurred him to stand.
I am Bridge Four's slave, he'd told Kaladin. But as bitter as he was over being an afterthought…
Sarus knew his secret, and had kept it. Kaladin had come back to the warcamp for him—would have come back, even if he'd had to do it alone. Everyone who had been at the Tower said so, and Rlain believed them.
He didn't trust Kaladin. But he trusted Sarus. And he cared about both of them. And Moash, Evenk, Torfin, and Delp. He didn't know them well—pretending to be a creature who seldom spoke, and never prompted others to speak, made it difficult to get to know anyone. But they were Bridge Four. And even if he wasn't, not really… part of him wanted to be.
He stepped up to Murk. "I want to come," he said, and found that he was speaking to the Rhythm of Resolve.
Murk blinked at him. "Shen?"
"I want to come," repeated Rlain. "I want to see if they're all right."
Murk's surprise faded into understanding. "Huh. Fair enough. Rock, can you spare Shen?"
"Of course," said Rock, waving them away. "There is no meal to prepare for hours. Go."
And so Rlain followed Murk and his squad out of the barrack and into the warcamp proper.
He didn't notice anything unusual about the people on the streets until Murk commented under his breath, "What in Chanarach's havah is going on?"
Rlain blinked, and suddenly realized that the crowds were acting odd. Humans, men and women alike, were seeking out those they knew and speaking in low voices. Some sort of news or rumor was spreading through the warcamp. And Rlain saw many of them shoot the men of Bridge Four looks as they passed. He had never been good enough at judging human expressions to guess at what they were thinking.
"What in Damnation happened last night?" said Yake.
"Don't know," said Murk. "But I intend to find out." He led them to the edge of the Kholin warcamp, and then to the royal warcamp where King Elhokar's palace loomed over his feasting basin and the dueling grounds. The sentries let them pass. Were there more of them than usual?
They had made it about halfway from the edge of the camp to the palace when, finally, they found a familiar face. Two familiar faces—Moash and Torfin were walking in the opposite direction. Their faces were pale. They looked haggard, exhausted—that, at least, was a look Rlain had learned to identify on human faces.
"Moash!" Murk called. The two men turned in their direction.
"Murk." Moash's voice was rough in the way human voices sometimes got when their throats were either overtaxed or sickening. "What are you doing here? It's not your shift for a few hours."
"Looking for you!" Murk exclaimed. "Talenelat's bleeding knuckles, man, we've been waiting in the barracks for hours with no word! What happened last night? Where are the others? Where's Kaladin?"
Moash's eyes closed momentarily—somewhere between a blink and momentarily passing out. "Kaladin's fine," he said. "Evenk and Delp are dead."
Rlain's breath caught. Without even thinking about it he attuned the Rhythm of the Lost.
"Dead?" Murk asked, sounding like he'd been punched in the gut. "What? How? Did—was there an assassination attempt?"
"Yes," said Moash. "The Assassin in White came for the highprince."
A terrible silence fell. Rlain's hands were suddenly shaking. The Assassin in White had been employed by his people, once. Eshonai had once told him that the man had obeyed them because they had carried a small, polished stone. That stone had been lost as Eshonai and the others escaped Kholinar, thrown away so that they would not have to be responsible for the strange, terrifying assassin.
…If they had kept the man, brought him back with them, might Evenk and Delp be alive now? And would the Listeners be blamed for the attack?
"The Assassin in White?" Murk whispered. "Is Dalinar—"
"Still alive."
"Sarus," Rlain said. He had noticed that one name had not been mentioned, either among the living or the dead.
Murk blinked at him, then looked back at Moash. "Like Shen said. Is Sarus all right?"
Moash's face twisted. "Don't know."
"Don't—"
"His heart's still beating," said Moash. "Somehow. He's unconscious, though. I don't… we don't know if he'll wake up."
"Why wouldn't he wake up?" Murk asked.
Moash just shook his head. "Look, Murk, I heard the story probably ten times in the past six hours and I still can't even wrap my head around it." He jerked his thumb at the palace behind him. "Go up to the ardents' infirmary. Second floor, north wing. Kaladin's there with him."
"Fine," Murk said. "Go get some sleep, Moash."
"I plan to," muttered Moash, turning away and stomping away from the palace, leaning on his spear. Torfin followed him.
"Come on, men," Murk said, beckoning, and the rest of them followed him into the palace.
Several ardents stopped what they were doing to stare at them as they approached the infirmary. There were strange expressions on their faces, as varied as the marbling on a singer's skin, but Rlain couldn't have read any of them even if he had cared to. As they stepped into the infirmary, one ardent started up from a desk near the doorway. He seemed to have been writing something, and Rlain could see several crumpled pages in a basket at his feet.
"You're men of Bridge Four," he said. His eyes were wide, and his tone—was that reverence? Rlain wasn't sure. "Are you here to see the Shardbreaker?"
"The—what?" Murk blinked at the man.
"Murk?" Kaladin's voice, and a moment later his head, emerged from the doorway to a side room. "Is that you?"
"Kaladin," said Murk. "I feel like I've said this half a dozen times already—what in Damnation is happening?"
Kaladin stared at them for a long moment. His face was drawn, and there were dark rings beneath his eyes. If Rlain remembered correctly, that was a sign of exhaustion in humans. "Come on in," he said. "Sarus is sleeping."
They passed the ardent and entered the small room. It was too small for all of them to comfortably fit, but they managed to squeeze in.
Sarus lay on a cot, perfectly still. He looked… different. It was still recognizably him, but it was like the transformation of a Listener entering nimbleform from warform. His face was deathly pale. He seemed thinner than he had been before, somehow. But, most notably, his hair—once prematurely greying after so long running the bridge—had gone entirely white.
Beside his head were two chairs. Kaladin sat down in one. Archive was seated in the other. The inkspren didn't look up as they entered. Her eyes were fixed on her Elsecaller, lying as still as a corpse on the cot.
"What happened?" whispered Murk.
"Your voice may be," Archive said. Rlain was surprised to find that she wasn't even keeping her voice down, despite the presence of an ardent just down the hall. "He will not wake."
"But you might bring in an ardent wondering why there's a woman in here," Kaladin told her.
"Would it matter?" Archive asked, still staring down at Sarus' face.
Kaladin sighed. Then he turned to Murk. "The Assassin ran him through," he said. "With his Shardblade."
Rlain's eyes went wide. He heard several of the men gasp.
But Sarus was still breathing. Slowly and shallowly, true, but Rlain could see his chest rising and falling. How was that possible? How could a man survive being stabbed by a Shardblade?"
"Ran him through?" Murk whispered.
"Right through the heart," Kaladin said. "I saw it. And then…" The captain passed a shaking hand over his eyes. "It's hard to even describe what happened, Murk. I'd have assumed I was dreaming, except Adolin, Dalinar, and the Assassin all saw it too. I'm still not totally convinced this isn't all a nightmare."
"Kelek's fingernails, man, if someone doesn't give me a straight answer soon," Murk growled, "I'm going to… well, I don't know what I'm going to do, but it's not going to be pretty!"
"The Assassin stabbed him," Kaladin said, looking down at the sleeping man. "And then… Sarus disappeared. Vanished, and the sword with him. In his place was someone else. Like no one I've ever seen before. He had to be nine or ten feet tall. Blonde hair and beard, and his eyes—they were glowing. Glowing gold. He looked around. Looked confused. The Assassin staggered back, looked terrified. And then—then the big man was gone, and Sarus was back. And then the Shardblade exploded."
Murk inhaled sharply. "Sorry, did you say the Shardblade—"
"Exploded, yeah." Kaladin leaned back in his chair, his eyes falling shut. "It was like nothing I've ever seen before. It shattered into almost twenty pieces. The Assassin stopped glowing. He was a Surgebinder, Murk, using Stormlight and Gravitation, just like me. But the moment that sword broke, it was like he lost the ability."
"He did," Syl's voice said softly. The honorspren appeared beside Archive's shoulder, looking down sadly at Sarus. Her hand came up to touch Archive's cheek's comfortingly. "That was no Shardblade. That was an Honorblade."
"A what?" Kaladin asked.
"An Honorblade." Murk's voice was a reverent whisper. "The weapons of the Heralds. You're sure?"
Syl nodded. "It was horrible," she whispered. "They were meant to be symbols. They were supposed to be of Honor. But now they're left to lesser people, just like the rest of the Shards."
"The Blade was not the only thing of Honor in that hall," Archive said softly. "The man was. You felt it?"
"I felt it." Syl shivered. "I've never felt anything like it before. Or if I have, I can't remember. It was like—I don't know. I can only imagine it was like being in the same room as Honor Himself."
Archive nodded. "I do not understand what was in that corridor," she said. "All I know is that my Radiant is lying unconscious after a wound that should have been fatal. I do not know when he will wake. If he will wake." Her eyes were still fixed on Sarus on the cot. "My fear is, Sylphrena. I am afraid."
Syl settled on the inkspren's shoulder and leaned into the nape of her neck without a word.
"They're calling him Shardbreaker," Kaladin said. "I think the ardents are trying to figure out how to react. It's looking like they're going to call it a miracle."
"Can't blame them," muttered Murk.
"Sure, it's understandable. But I don't know what it's going to cause. I don't know how people are going to react." Kaladin let out a sigh. "Sarus would know. But he can't exactly offer his opinion right now."
"No," muttered Murk. "No, I guess not. Storms." He tore his eyes from Sarus and looked at Kaladin. "You're dead on your feet, Kal."
"I'm not on my feet," Kaladin said.
"You know what I mean. Come on, come back to the barrack. Get some sleep."
"I'm not leaving Sarus undefended," Kaladin said. "What if Sadeas decides to come after him while he's unconscious? The man knows Sarus personally—hates him, personally. He might decide that he doesn't want to let the ardents turn Sarus into a living legend."
"I will protect him," said Rlain softly.
Kaladin glanced up at him. So did several of the others. Then, after a long moment, Kaladin nodded. "Okay," he said, standing. Then he held out a hand.
No. Not a hand.
"You'll need this," said Kaladin, offering Rlain his spear.
Rlain stared at it for a long moment. Then he reached out and took it.
"You're not a slave, Shen," Kaladin said softly. "I'm sorry I ever made you feel like you were."
"My name," Rlain said, before he could second-guess himself. "It is not Shen. It is Rlain."
Kaladin nodded. "Rlain, then. Thank you."
He followed Murk and his squad out of the small room. Rlain took the seat he had vacated. Seated across from each other, he and Archive lingered in silence, watching over the only human who knew both their secrets.
-x-x-x-
41
Of Honor
-x-x-x-
41
Of Honor
-x-x-x-
The few times I was happened upon by a roving band of orcs or an adventurer from Rhûn, I killed them or fled to a different mountain. What choice did I have? For if any found me and reported my location to their people, I was sure that I would be hunted and killed.
-x-x-x-
Rlain didn't worry when the highstorm passed over the barrack. It was just one more storm. There was nothing unusual about it. Certainly, he longed to go out into it and try to attract a spren, to escape the shell of dullform that left his mind and body sluggish. But he resisted that temptation, just as he always did.
Kaladin and Sarus were both away watching the king and highprince this storm. He didn't worry about that either. With Sarus in charge of the king's guard rotations, and Kaladin in charge of the highprince's, highstorms usually required the both of them. Moash was there, too. That was all three of Bridge Four's best spearmen.
Rlain didn't expect them to need those skills in the middle of a storm. But if they did, it wouldn't have occurred to him to worry that they might be insufficient.
He didn't worry when the riddens gave way to a clearing sky. Nomon shone brilliant blue overhead, the color of a windspren's soft glow illuminating the world. The storm had come near the start of the night shift today, so Sarus and Kaladin would both still be on duty for a few more hours.
He did start to worry when he woke up to help Rock cook breakfast, several hours later, and they still hadn't returned. It wasn't the first time a guard shift had been irregular for one reason or another. Everything was probably fine. But it was a sign that maybe, just maybe, something was wrong.
Rock shot Rlain a look when he cut himself chopping sweet vinebuds for the porridge. "You are worried," the big Horneater observed.
Rlain didn't answer. Both because he had to avoid rousing suspicion that he was more independent-minded than a parshman, and because his dullform brain couldn't come up with anything to say.
"I am worried too," Rock confided. "Morning shift left to relieve the night shift more than an hour ago. Kaladin and the others should have been back by now."
Rlain nodded. They continued working in silence, soon joined by Lopen. The one-armed Herdazian's chatter soothed Rlain's concerns. Everything was fine. Kaladin and Sarus had probably been held up by some unexpected need for more guards. Maybe a plateau run had been called at night—that didn't normally happen, but it wasn't unheard of—and they'd needed to go out onto the Plains to defend Prince Renarin and Highprince Dalinar. Or maybe something had caused the Kholin family to split up completely, requiring both first and second shift to combine to defend all of them. There were any number of reasons why they wouldn't have returned promptly. Such things happened. There was no cause for concern.
But then the minutes stretched into an hour. Into two. And Rlain could no longer tell himself that there was no cause for worry.
"All right," said Murk sharply, standing suddenly from the hand of cards he'd been playing with Rock, Gadol, Eth, and Mart. "My squad, grab your gear. We're going to see what's happening."
Several men leapt to their feet and started towards the racks near the front of the room, where their spears were waiting for them. And suddenly, the same impulse that had driven Rlain to ask Kaladin for a spear spurred him to stand.
I am Bridge Four's slave, he'd told Kaladin. But as bitter as he was over being an afterthought…
Sarus knew his secret, and had kept it. Kaladin had come back to the warcamp for him—would have come back, even if he'd had to do it alone. Everyone who had been at the Tower said so, and Rlain believed them.
He didn't trust Kaladin. But he trusted Sarus. And he cared about both of them. And Moash, Evenk, Torfin, and Delp. He didn't know them well—pretending to be a creature who seldom spoke, and never prompted others to speak, made it difficult to get to know anyone. But they were Bridge Four. And even if he wasn't, not really… part of him wanted to be.
He stepped up to Murk. "I want to come," he said, and found that he was speaking to the Rhythm of Resolve.
Murk blinked at him. "Shen?"
"I want to come," repeated Rlain. "I want to see if they're all right."
Murk's surprise faded into understanding. "Huh. Fair enough. Rock, can you spare Shen?"
"Of course," said Rock, waving them away. "There is no meal to prepare for hours. Go."
And so Rlain followed Murk and his squad out of the barrack and into the warcamp proper.
He didn't notice anything unusual about the people on the streets until Murk commented under his breath, "What in Chanarach's havah is going on?"
Rlain blinked, and suddenly realized that the crowds were acting odd. Humans, men and women alike, were seeking out those they knew and speaking in low voices. Some sort of news or rumor was spreading through the warcamp. And Rlain saw many of them shoot the men of Bridge Four looks as they passed. He had never been good enough at judging human expressions to guess at what they were thinking.
"What in Damnation happened last night?" said Yake.
"Don't know," said Murk. "But I intend to find out." He led them to the edge of the Kholin warcamp, and then to the royal warcamp where King Elhokar's palace loomed over his feasting basin and the dueling grounds. The sentries let them pass. Were there more of them than usual?
They had made it about halfway from the edge of the camp to the palace when, finally, they found a familiar face. Two familiar faces—Moash and Torfin were walking in the opposite direction. Their faces were pale. They looked haggard, exhausted—that, at least, was a look Rlain had learned to identify on human faces.
"Moash!" Murk called. The two men turned in their direction.
"Murk." Moash's voice was rough in the way human voices sometimes got when their throats were either overtaxed or sickening. "What are you doing here? It's not your shift for a few hours."
"Looking for you!" Murk exclaimed. "Talenelat's bleeding knuckles, man, we've been waiting in the barracks for hours with no word! What happened last night? Where are the others? Where's Kaladin?"
Moash's eyes closed momentarily—somewhere between a blink and momentarily passing out. "Kaladin's fine," he said. "Evenk and Delp are dead."
Rlain's breath caught. Without even thinking about it he attuned the Rhythm of the Lost.
"Dead?" Murk asked, sounding like he'd been punched in the gut. "What? How? Did—was there an assassination attempt?"
"Yes," said Moash. "The Assassin in White came for the highprince."
A terrible silence fell. Rlain's hands were suddenly shaking. The Assassin in White had been employed by his people, once. Eshonai had once told him that the man had obeyed them because they had carried a small, polished stone. That stone had been lost as Eshonai and the others escaped Kholinar, thrown away so that they would not have to be responsible for the strange, terrifying assassin.
…If they had kept the man, brought him back with them, might Evenk and Delp be alive now? And would the Listeners be blamed for the attack?
"The Assassin in White?" Murk whispered. "Is Dalinar—"
"Still alive."
"Sarus," Rlain said. He had noticed that one name had not been mentioned, either among the living or the dead.
Murk blinked at him, then looked back at Moash. "Like Shen said. Is Sarus all right?"
Moash's face twisted. "Don't know."
"Don't—"
"His heart's still beating," said Moash. "Somehow. He's unconscious, though. I don't… we don't know if he'll wake up."
"Why wouldn't he wake up?" Murk asked.
Moash just shook his head. "Look, Murk, I heard the story probably ten times in the past six hours and I still can't even wrap my head around it." He jerked his thumb at the palace behind him. "Go up to the ardents' infirmary. Second floor, north wing. Kaladin's there with him."
"Fine," Murk said. "Go get some sleep, Moash."
"I plan to," muttered Moash, turning away and stomping away from the palace, leaning on his spear. Torfin followed him.
"Come on, men," Murk said, beckoning, and the rest of them followed him into the palace.
Several ardents stopped what they were doing to stare at them as they approached the infirmary. There were strange expressions on their faces, as varied as the marbling on a singer's skin, but Rlain couldn't have read any of them even if he had cared to. As they stepped into the infirmary, one ardent started up from a desk near the doorway. He seemed to have been writing something, and Rlain could see several crumpled pages in a basket at his feet.
"You're men of Bridge Four," he said. His eyes were wide, and his tone—was that reverence? Rlain wasn't sure. "Are you here to see the Shardbreaker?"
"The—what?" Murk blinked at the man.
"Murk?" Kaladin's voice, and a moment later his head, emerged from the doorway to a side room. "Is that you?"
"Kaladin," said Murk. "I feel like I've said this half a dozen times already—what in Damnation is happening?"
Kaladin stared at them for a long moment. His face was drawn, and there were dark rings beneath his eyes. If Rlain remembered correctly, that was a sign of exhaustion in humans. "Come on in," he said. "Sarus is sleeping."
They passed the ardent and entered the small room. It was too small for all of them to comfortably fit, but they managed to squeeze in.
Sarus lay on a cot, perfectly still. He looked… different. It was still recognizably him, but it was like the transformation of a Listener entering nimbleform from warform. His face was deathly pale. He seemed thinner than he had been before, somehow. But, most notably, his hair—once prematurely greying after so long running the bridge—had gone entirely white.
Beside his head were two chairs. Kaladin sat down in one. Archive was seated in the other. The inkspren didn't look up as they entered. Her eyes were fixed on her Elsecaller, lying as still as a corpse on the cot.
"What happened?" whispered Murk.
"Your voice may be," Archive said. Rlain was surprised to find that she wasn't even keeping her voice down, despite the presence of an ardent just down the hall. "He will not wake."
"But you might bring in an ardent wondering why there's a woman in here," Kaladin told her.
"Would it matter?" Archive asked, still staring down at Sarus' face.
Kaladin sighed. Then he turned to Murk. "The Assassin ran him through," he said. "With his Shardblade."
Rlain's eyes went wide. He heard several of the men gasp.
But Sarus was still breathing. Slowly and shallowly, true, but Rlain could see his chest rising and falling. How was that possible? How could a man survive being stabbed by a Shardblade?"
"Ran him through?" Murk whispered.
"Right through the heart," Kaladin said. "I saw it. And then…" The captain passed a shaking hand over his eyes. "It's hard to even describe what happened, Murk. I'd have assumed I was dreaming, except Adolin, Dalinar, and the Assassin all saw it too. I'm still not totally convinced this isn't all a nightmare."
"Kelek's fingernails, man, if someone doesn't give me a straight answer soon," Murk growled, "I'm going to… well, I don't know what I'm going to do, but it's not going to be pretty!"
"The Assassin stabbed him," Kaladin said, looking down at the sleeping man. "And then… Sarus disappeared. Vanished, and the sword with him. In his place was someone else. Like no one I've ever seen before. He had to be nine or ten feet tall. Blonde hair and beard, and his eyes—they were glowing. Glowing gold. He looked around. Looked confused. The Assassin staggered back, looked terrified. And then—then the big man was gone, and Sarus was back. And then the Shardblade exploded."
Murk inhaled sharply. "Sorry, did you say the Shardblade—"
"Exploded, yeah." Kaladin leaned back in his chair, his eyes falling shut. "It was like nothing I've ever seen before. It shattered into almost twenty pieces. The Assassin stopped glowing. He was a Surgebinder, Murk, using Stormlight and Gravitation, just like me. But the moment that sword broke, it was like he lost the ability."
"He did," Syl's voice said softly. The honorspren appeared beside Archive's shoulder, looking down sadly at Sarus. Her hand came up to touch Archive's cheek's comfortingly. "That was no Shardblade. That was an Honorblade."
"A what?" Kaladin asked.
"An Honorblade." Murk's voice was a reverent whisper. "The weapons of the Heralds. You're sure?"
Syl nodded. "It was horrible," she whispered. "They were meant to be symbols. They were supposed to be of Honor. But now they're left to lesser people, just like the rest of the Shards."
"The Blade was not the only thing of Honor in that hall," Archive said softly. "The man was. You felt it?"
"I felt it." Syl shivered. "I've never felt anything like it before. Or if I have, I can't remember. It was like—I don't know. I can only imagine it was like being in the same room as Honor Himself."
Archive nodded. "I do not understand what was in that corridor," she said. "All I know is that my Radiant is lying unconscious after a wound that should have been fatal. I do not know when he will wake. If he will wake." Her eyes were still fixed on Sarus on the cot. "My fear is, Sylphrena. I am afraid."
Syl settled on the inkspren's shoulder and leaned into the nape of her neck without a word.
"They're calling him Shardbreaker," Kaladin said. "I think the ardents are trying to figure out how to react. It's looking like they're going to call it a miracle."
"Can't blame them," muttered Murk.
"Sure, it's understandable. But I don't know what it's going to cause. I don't know how people are going to react." Kaladin let out a sigh. "Sarus would know. But he can't exactly offer his opinion right now."
"No," muttered Murk. "No, I guess not. Storms." He tore his eyes from Sarus and looked at Kaladin. "You're dead on your feet, Kal."
"I'm not on my feet," Kaladin said.
"You know what I mean. Come on, come back to the barrack. Get some sleep."
"I'm not leaving Sarus undefended," Kaladin said. "What if Sadeas decides to come after him while he's unconscious? The man knows Sarus personally—hates him, personally. He might decide that he doesn't want to let the ardents turn Sarus into a living legend."
"I will protect him," said Rlain softly.
Kaladin glanced up at him. So did several of the others. Then, after a long moment, Kaladin nodded. "Okay," he said, standing. Then he held out a hand.
No. Not a hand.
"You'll need this," said Kaladin, offering Rlain his spear.
Rlain stared at it for a long moment. Then he reached out and took it.
"You're not a slave, Shen," Kaladin said softly. "I'm sorry I ever made you feel like you were."
"My name," Rlain said, before he could second-guess himself. "It is not Shen. It is Rlain."
Kaladin nodded. "Rlain, then. Thank you."
He followed Murk and his squad out of the small room. Rlain took the seat he had vacated. Seated across from each other, he and Archive lingered in silence, watching over the only human who knew both their secrets.
- Location
- Book Fort
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Oof. All the feels in this update. Rlain showing a bit more trust to Kaladin, united as they are in their shared concern for Sarus.
If only Sarus could see Archive, and her worry for him. Her love twisted into pained concern by his injuries; pain born of their bond --proof of their bond.
I know Sarus has been clinging to his better self by his fingernails, and has resisted the emotional impulses born of envy and insecurity. I hope he remains as true to his better self as he has been thus far. He has more close, positive social connections than Saruman did, and isn't isolated as Saruman was, either.
My worry is that Sarus will receive the memories of Saruman's countless centuries and be flattened by it. I worry that Sarus will take the path that is easy (manipulation, emotional distance, rationalization), rather than the path that is right (honesty, emotional intelligence and vulnerability, earnestness).
Sarus is a good man, and wants to be a better one. I worry that his injuries and Roshar won't let him remain one.
In case you couldn't tell, this is a lovely update, and I find myself drawn into Sarus and his plight. Things are heating up, and I worry that his heart and his hands will be scarred and sullied before it's all over.
Here's hoping that Sarus can remain true to himself, and leverage Saruman's abilities to affect positive change.
If only Sarus could see Archive, and her worry for him. Her love twisted into pained concern by his injuries; pain born of their bond --proof of their bond.
I know Sarus has been clinging to his better self by his fingernails, and has resisted the emotional impulses born of envy and insecurity. I hope he remains as true to his better self as he has been thus far. He has more close, positive social connections than Saruman did, and isn't isolated as Saruman was, either.
My worry is that Sarus will receive the memories of Saruman's countless centuries and be flattened by it. I worry that Sarus will take the path that is easy (manipulation, emotional distance, rationalization), rather than the path that is right (honesty, emotional intelligence and vulnerability, earnestness).
Sarus is a good man, and wants to be a better one. I worry that his injuries and Roshar won't let him remain one.
In case you couldn't tell, this is a lovely update, and I find myself drawn into Sarus and his plight. Things are heating up, and I worry that his heart and his hands will be scarred and sullied before it's all over.
Here's hoping that Sarus can remain true to himself, and leverage Saruman's abilities to affect positive change.
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I'm not liking the weird switch that happened last chapter. Personally I hope the main cast of the stormlight archive + Sarus remain the protagonist. I'd rather not have unrelated characters make an appearance and steal the main cast spotlight.
(Except Shallan, nothing of value would be lost if she disappeared forever. )
It doesn't really help that i don't know most of the LOTR lore, I've only seen the movies... So I don't really know what the hell is happening...
(Except Shallan, nothing of value would be lost if she disappeared forever.
)It doesn't really help that i don't know most of the LOTR lore, I've only seen the movies... So I don't really know what the hell is happening...
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Lithos Maitreya
Character Witness
- Location
- United States
Let me be completely clear. Sarus and the Stormlight Archives characters are the main characters of this story. The vision in the last chapter was a specific tie-in to the epilogue chapter in Ring-Maker that I used to announce this story more than a year ago. It is not an indication that the characters shown there are going to be an immediate part of this story or a major part of this story at any point. While those characters will likely appear in the epilogue of this story, they are not going to solve the problems in this story proper.
The things about the vision last chapter that are relevant to this story immediately are the identity of the person who was swapped in for Sarus temporarily, and how Sarus and the other characters will react both to the vision itself and to the whole Shard-breaking thing that surrounds it.
I made the mistake of having characters from outside the story's context solve the stories problems in The Seventh Coming, and I regret it. I'm not making that mistake again with a story that is so much larger in scope.
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- Location
- Mexico
So.. who is the person from the vision?
Lithos Maitreya
Character Witness
- Location
- United States
I can't answer that question without spoiling Ring-Maker, because that vision is part of Constellation E.4, one of Ring-Maker's epilogues. But since Ring-Maker isn't required reading, here's an answer in spoilers:
The young woman is Taylor Hebert, a.k.a. the Maia formerly known as Sauron, now operating under the name Mairë. The man is Celebrimbor. The woman on the screen is Dragon, current bearer of Vilya, the Ring of Air. The person who switched places with Sarus was Tulkas Astaldo.
None of the above is necessary to follow Of Many Colors.
- Location
- Toronto, Ontario, Canada, Earth
- Pronouns
- She/They
Some further context in case anyone doesn't care about spoilers, but doesn't recognize some of the LotR names, since they don't really appear in the films.
Celebrimbor was the leader of the elven kingdom Sauron duped into helping make the Rings of Power, and the man who personally forged the "Three rings for the elven-kings under the sky". Vilya is a second forging of one of those rings (the original was chiefly worn by Elrond) that Taylor/Sauron/Mairë makes in Ringmaker. Tulkas Astaldo is a Vala, what men would call gods, and could be called the war god amongst the Valar, enjoying a spot of righteous fisticuffs (like that time he wrestled Melkor, aka LotR Lucifer, into submission)".
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- Location
- United States
After binging Ring-Maker and then this in a week, it feels like I did so at the perfect time, right as the quick crossover moment happens. This story is incredible, and I can't wait for more of it!
As a fellow writer, i just want to say that creativity and writing is a fluid process, as you no doubt are familiar with. Don't give a damn about contradicting other sources, just focus on being consistent within the framework you set out for what you're writing. (as someone who also has spent many years as a Tolkien nerd and far too much money and time on the various different available writings of the man about Legendarium stuff, and how weird the fandom can be about "canonicity" at times)
Again though, you already probably are familiar with this, but I like to encourage. Even if I'm not any good at it.
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Winged One
Not the Simurgh
- Location
- definitely the ground
- Pronouns
- They/Them/It
I binged this entire fanfic complex, and regret only that I ever paused reading Ring-Maker in the first place.