Words of Radiance

Adolin scowled. “There’s something odd about you, bridgeboy,” he said. “Admit it.”

“I admit nothing.”

“You survived that fall with the assassin,” Adolin said. “And at first, I worried you were working with him. Now . . .”

“Now what?”

“Well, I’ve decided that whatever you are, you’re on my side.” Adolin sighed. “Anyway, the assassin. My instincts say the best plan is the one we used when fighting together in the arena. You distract him while I kill him.”

“That could work, though I worry that he’s not the type to let himself get distracted.”

“Neither was Relis,” Adolin said. “We’ll do it, bridgeboy. You and I. We’re going to bring that monster down.”

“We’ll need to be fast,” Kaladin said. “He’ll win a drawn-out fight. And Adolin, strike for the spine or the head. Don’t try a weakening blow first. Go right for the kill.”

Adolin frowned at him. “Why?”

“I saw something when the two of us fell together,” Kaladin said. “I cut him, but he healed the wound somehow.”

“I have a Blade. He won’t be able to heal from that . . . right?”

“Best to not find out. Strike to kill. Trust me.”

Adolin met his eyes. “Oddly, I do. Trust you, I mean. It’s a very strange sensation.”

“Yeah, well, I’ll try to hold myself back from going skipping across the plateau in joy.”

Adolin grinned. “I’d pay to see that.”

“Me skipping?”

“You happy,” Adolin said, laughing. “You’ve got a face like a storm! I half think you could frighten off a storm.”

Kaladin grunted.

Adolin laughed again, slapping him on the shoulder, then turned as Shallan finally crossed the bridge, her sketching apparently done. She looked to Adolin fondly, and as he reached out to take her hand, she rose up on her toes and gave him a kiss on the cheek. Adolin drew back, startled. Alethi were more reserved than that in public.

Shallan grinned at him. Then she turned and gasped, raising a hand to her mouth. Kaladin jumped, again, looking for danger—but Shallan just went dashing off to a nearby clump of rocks.

Adolin raised his hand to his cheek, then looked to Kaladin with a grin. “She probably saw an interesting bug.”

“No, it’s moss!” Shallan called back.

“Ah, of course,” Adolin said, strolling over, Kaladin following. “Moss. So exciting.”

“Hush, you,” Shallan said, wagging her pencil at him as she bent down, inspecting the rocks. “The moss grows in a strange pattern here. What could cause that?”

“Alcohol,” Adolin said.

She glanced at him.

He shrugged. “Makes me do crazy things.” He looked at Kaladin, who shook his head. “That was funny,” Adolin said. “It was a joke! Well, kind of.”

“Oh hush,” Shallan said. “This looks almost like the same pattern as a flowering rockbud, the kind common here on the Plains. . . .” She started sketching.

Kaladin folded his arms. Then he sighed.

“What does that sigh mean?” Adolin asked him.

“Boredom,” Kaladin said, glancing back at the army, still crossing the bridge. With a force of three thousand—that was about half of Dalinar’s current army, following heavy recruitment—moving out here took time. On bridge runs, these crossings had felt so quick. Kaladin had always been exhausted, savoring the chance to rest. “I guess out here, it’s so barren that there’s not much to get excited about other than moss.”

“You hush too,” Shallan told him. “Go polish your bridge or something.” She leaned in, then poked her pencil at a bug that was crawling across the moss. “Ah . . .” she said, then hurriedly scribbled some notes. “Anyway, you’re wrong. There’s a lot out here to get excited about, if you look in the right places. Some of the soldiers said a chasmfiend has been spotted. Do you think it might attack us?”

“You sound entirely too hopeful saying that, Shallan,” Adolin said.

“Well, I do still need a good sketch of one.”

“We’ll get you to the chrysalis. That will have to be enough.”

Shallan’s scholarship was an excuse; the truth was obvious to Kaladin. Dalinar had brought an unusual number of scouts with him today, and Kaladin suspected once they reached the chrysalis—which was on the border of unexplored lands—they’d range ahead and gather information. This was all preparation for Dalinar’s expedition.

“I don’t understand why we need so many soldiers,” Shallan said, noticing Kaladin’s gaze as he studied the army. “Didn’t you say the Parshendi haven’t been showing up to fight over chrysalises lately?”

“No, they haven’t,” Adolin said. “That’s precisely what makes us worried.”

Kaladin nodded. “Whenever your enemy changes established tactics, you need to worry. It could mean they’re getting desperate. Desperation is very, very dangerous.”

“You’re good at military thinking, for a bridgeboy,” Adolin said.

“Coincidentally,” Kaladin said, “you’re good at not being unobnoxious, for a prince.”

“Thanks,” Adolin said.

“That was an insult, dear,” Shallan said.

“What?” Adolin said. “It was?”

She nodded, still sketching, though she glanced up to eye Kaladin. He met the expression calmly.

“Adolin,” Shallan said, turning back to the small rock formation in front of her, “would you slay this moss for me, please?”

“Slay . . . the moss.” He looked at Kaladin, who just shrugged. How was he to know what a lighteyed woman meant? They were a strange breed.

“Yes,” Shallan said, standing up. “Give that moss, and the rock behind it, a good chop. As a favor for your betrothed.”

Adolin looked baffled, but he did as she asked, summoning his Shardblade and hacking at the moss and rock. The top of the small pile of stones slipped free, cut with ease, and clattered to the floor of the plateau.

Shallan stepped up eagerly, crouching down beside the perfectly flat top of the sliced stone. “Mmm,” she said, nodding to herself. She started sketching.

Adolin dismissed his Blade. “Women!” he said, shrugging at Kaladin. Then he went jogging off to get a drink without asking her for an explanation.

Kaladin took a step after him, but then hesitated. What did Shallan find so interesting here? This woman was a puzzle, and he knew he wouldn’t be completely comfortable until he understood her. She had too much access to Adolin, and therefore Dalinar, to leave uninvestigated.

He stepped closer, looking over her shoulder as she drew. “Strata,” he said. “You’re counting the strata of crem to guess how old the rock is.”

“Good guess,” she said, “but this is a bad location for strata dating. The wind blows across the plateaus too strongly, and the crem doesn’t collect in pools evenly. So the strata here are erratic and inaccurate.”

Kaladin frowned, narrowing his eyes. The cross section of rock was normal cremstone on the outside, some strata visible as different shades of brown. The center of the stone, though, was white. You didn’t see white rock like that often; it had to be quarried. Which meant this was either a very strange occurrence, or . . .

“There was a structure here once,” Kaladin said. “A long time ago. It must have taken centuries for the crem to get that thick on something sticking out of the ground.”

She glanced at him. “You’re smarter than you look.” Then, turning back to her drawing, she added, “Good thing . . .”

He grunted. “Why does everything you say have to include some quip? Are you that desperate to prove how clever you are?”

“Perhaps I’m merely annoyed at you for taking advantage of Adolin.”

“Advantage?” Kaladin asked. “Because I called him obnoxious?”

“You deliberately said it in a way you expected he wouldn’t understand. To make him look like a fool. He’s trying very hard to be nice to you.”

“Yes,” Kaladin said. “He’s always so munificent to all of the little darkeyes who flock around to worship him.”

Shallan snapped her pencil against the page. “You really are a hateful man, aren’t you? Underneath the mock boredom, the dangerous glares, the growls—you just hate people, is that it?”

“What? No, I—”

“Adolin is trying. He feels bad for what happened to you, and he’s doing what he can to make up for it. He is a good man. Is it too much for you to stop provoking him?”

“He calls me bridgeboy,” Kaladin said, feeling stubborn. “He’s been provoking me.”

“Yes, because he is the one storming around with alternating scowls and insults,” Shallan said. “Adolin Kholin, the most difficult man to get along with on the Shattered Plains. I mean look at him! He’s so unlikable!”

She gestured with the pencil toward where Adolin was laughing with the darkeyed water boys. The groom walked up with Adolin’s horse, and Adolin took his Shardplate helm off the carrying post, handing it over, letting one of the water boys try it on. It was ridiculously large on the lad.