She let herself rove outward to the cracked wall that surrounded the city. She liked this place; it was old, and old things seemed … thoughtful to her. She walked along the base of the once-wall, passing listeners tending chulls, carrying in grain from the fields, hauling water. Many raised a hand or called to a rhythm when they saw her. She was famous now, unfortunately. She had to stop and chat with several listeners who wanted to ask about her expedition.
She suffered the attention with patience. Eshonai had spent years trying to inspire this kind of interest about the outside world. She wouldn’t throw away this goodwill now.
She managed to extract herself, and climbed up a watchpost along the wall. From it, she could see listeners from other families moving about on the Plains, or driving their hogs past the perimeter of the city.
There are more of them about than usual, she thought. One of the other families might be preparing an assault on the city. Would they be so bold? So soon after the humans had come and changed the world?
Yes, they would be. Eshonai’s own family had been that bold, after all. The others might assume Eshonai’s people were getting secrets, or special trade goods, from the humans. They would want to put themselves into a position to receive the humans’ blessings instead.
Eshonai needed to go to them and explain. Why fight, when there was so much more out there to experience? Why squabble over these old, broken-down cities? They could be building new ones as the humans did. She attuned Determination.
Then she attuned right back to Anxiety as she saw a figure walking distractedly along the base of the wall. Eshonai’s mother wore a loose brown robe, dull against the femalen’s gorgeous red and black skin patterns.
Eshonai climbed down and ran over. “Mother?”
“Ah,” her mother said to Anxiety. “I know you. Can you perhaps help me? I seem to find myself in an odd situation.”
Eshonai took her mother by the arm. “Mother.”
“Yes. Yes, I’m your mother. You are Eshonai.” The femalen looked around, then she leaned in. “Can you tell me how I arrived here, Eshonai? I don’t seem to remember.”
“You were going to wait for me to get home,” Eshonai said. “With food.”
“I was? Why didn’t I do that, then?”
“You must have lost track of time,” Eshonai said, to Consolation. “Let’s get you home.”
Jaxlim hummed to Determination and refused to be budged, seeming to become more conscious, more herself by the second. “Eshonai,” she said, “we have to confront this. This is not simply me feeling tired. This is something worse.”
“Maybe not, Mother,” Eshonai said. “Maybe it…”
Her mother hummed to the Rhythm of the Lost. Eshonai trailed off.
“I must make certain your sister knows the songs,” Jaxlim said. “We may have reached the riddens of my life, Eshonai.”
“Please, come and rest,” Eshonai said to Peace.
“Rest is for those with time to spare, dear,” her mother said, but let herself be led in the direction of their home. She pulled her robe tight. “I can face this. Our ancestors took weakness upon themselves to bring our people into existence. They faced frailty of body and mind. I can face this with grace. I must.”
Eshonai settled her at home with something to eat. Then, Eshonai considered getting out her new maps to show her mother, but hesitated. Jaxlim never did like hearing about Eshonai’s travels. It was best not to upset her.
Why did it have to happen like this? Eshonai finally got what she wanted out of life. But progress, change, couldn’t happen without the passing of storms and the movement of years. Each day forward meant another day of regression for her mother.
Time. It was a sadistic master. It made adults of children—then gleefully, relentlessly, stole away everything it had given.
They were still eating when Venli returned. She always had a hidden smile these days, as if attuning Amusement in secret. She set her gemstone—the one with the spren—on the table.
“They’re going to try it,” Venli said. “They are taking volunteers now. I’m to provide a handful of these gemstones.”
“How did you learn to cut them as humans do?” Eshonai asked.
“It wasn’t hard,” Venli said. “It merely took a little practice.”
Their mother stared at the gemstone. She wiped her hands with a cloth, then picked it up. “Venli. I need you to return to practice. I don’t know how much longer I will be suited to being our keeper of songs.”
“Because your mind is giving out,” Venli said. “Mother, why do you think I’ve been working so hard to find these new forms? This can help.”
Eshonai attuned Surprise, glancing at their mother.
“Help?” Jaxlim said.
“Each form has a different way of thinking,” Venli said. “That is preserved in the songs. And some were stronger, more resilient to diseases, both physical and mental. So if you were to change to this new form…”
Her mother attuned Consideration.
“I … hadn’t realized this,” Eshonai said. “Mother, you must volunteer! This could be our answer!”
“I’ve been trying to get the elders to see,” Venli said. “They want young listeners to try the change first.”
“They will listen to me,” Jaxlim said to Determination. “It is, after all, my job to speak for them to hear. I will try this form, Venli. And if you have truly accomplished this goal of yours … well, I once thought that being our new keeper of songs would be your highest calling. I hadn’t considered that you might invent a calling with even more honor. Keeper of forms.”
Eshonai settled back, listening to her sister humming to Joy. Only … the beat was off somehow. Faster. More violent?
You’re imagining things, she told herself. Don’t let jealousy consume you, Eshonai. It could easily destroy your family.
I am told that it is not the sand itself, but something that grows upon it, that exhibits the strange properties. One can make more, with proper materials and a seed of the original.
—From Rhythm of War, page 13 undertext
Kaladin thrashed, sweating and trembling, his mind filled with visions of his friends dying. Of Rock frozen in the Peaks, of Lopen slain on a distant battlefield, of Teft dying alone, shriveled to bones, his eyes glazed over from repeated use of firemoss.
“No,” Kaladin screamed. “No!”
“Kaladin!” Syl said. She zipped around his head, filling his eyes with streaks of blue-white light. “You’re awake. You’re all right. Kaladin?”
He breathed in and out, taking deep lungfuls. The nightmares felt so real, and they lingered. Like the scent of blood on your clothing after a battle.
He forced himself to his feet, and was surprised to find a small bag of glowing gemstones on the room’s stone ledge.
“From Dabbid,” Syl said. “He left them a little earlier, along with some broth, then grabbed the jug to go get water.”
“How did he…” Maybe he’d gotten them from the ardent at the monastery? Or maybe he’d quietly taken them from somewhere else. Dabbid could move around the tower in ways that Kaladin couldn’t—people always looked at Kaladin, remembered him. It was the height, he guessed. Or maybe it was the way he held himself. He’d never learned to keep his head down properly, even when he’d been a slave.
Kaladin shook his head, then did his morning routine: stretches, exercises, then washing as best he could with a cloth and some water. After that he saw to Teft, washing him, then shifting the way the man was lying to help prevent bedsores. That all done, Kaladin knelt beside Teft’s bench with the syringe and broth, trying to find solace from his own mind through the calming act of feeding his friend.
Syl settled onto the stone bench beside Teft as Kaladin worked, wearing her girlish dress, sitting with her knees pulled up against her chest and her arms wrapped around them. Neither of them spoke for a long while as Kaladin worked.
“I wish he were awake,” Syl finally whispered. �
��There’s something happy about the way Teft is angry.”
Kaladin nodded.
“I went to Dalinar,” she said, “before he left. I asked him if he could make me feel like humans do. Sad sometimes.”
“What?” Kaladin asked. “Why in the Almighty’s tenth name would you do something like that?”
“I wanted to feel what you feel,” she said.
“Nobody should have to feel like I do.”
“I’m my own person, Kaladin. I can make decisions for myself.” She stared sightlessly past Teft and Kaladin. “It was in talking to him that I started remembering my old knight, like I told you. I think Dalinar did something. I wanted him to Connect me to you. He refused. But I think he somehow Connected me to who I was. Made me able to remember, and hurt again…”
Kaladin felt helpless. He had never been able to struggle through his own feelings of darkness. How did he help someone else?
Tien could do it, he thought. Tien would know what to say.
Storms, he missed his brother. Even after all these years.
“I think,” Syl said, “that we spren have a problem. We think we don’t change. You’ll hear us say it sometimes. ‘Men change. Singers change. Spren don’t.’ We think that because pieces of us are eternal, we are as well. But pieces of humans are eternal too.
“If we can choose, we can change. If we can’t change, then choice means nothing. I’m glad I feel this way, to remind me that I haven’t always felt the same. Been the same. It means that in coming here to find another Knight Radiant, I was deciding. Not simply doing what I was made to, but doing what I wanted to.”
Kaladin cocked his head, the syringe full of broth halfway to Teft’s lips. “When I’m at my worst, I feel like I can’t change. Like I’ve never changed. That I’ve always felt this way, and always will.”
“When you get like that,” Syl said, “let me know, all right? Maybe it will help to talk to me about it.”
“Yeah. All right.”
“And Kal?” she said. “Do the same for me.”
He nodded, and the two of them fell silent. Kaladin wanted to say more. He should have said more. But he felt so tired. Exhaustionspren swirled in the room, though he’d slept half the day.
He could see the signs. Or rather, he couldn’t ignore them anymore. He was deeply within the grip of battle shock, and the tower being under occupation didn’t magically fix that. It made things worse. More fighting. More time alone. More people depending on him.
Killing, loneliness, and stress. An unholy triumvirate, working together with spears and knives to corner him. Then they just. Kept. Stabbing.
“Kaladin?” Syl said.
He realized he’d been sitting there, not moving, for … how long? Storms. He quickly refilled the syringe and lifted it to Teft’s lips. The man was stirring again, muttering, and Kaladin could almost make out what he was saying. Something about his parents?
Soon the door opened and Dabbid entered. He gave Kaladin a quick salute, then hurried over to the bench near Teft and put something down on the stone. He gestured urgently.
“What’s this?” Kaladin asked, then unwrapped the cloth to reveal some kind of fabrial. It looked like a leather bracer, the type Dalinar and Navani wore to tell the time. Only the construction was different. It had long leather straps on it, and a metal portion—like a handle—that came up and went across the palm. Turning it over, Kaladin found ten rubies in the bracer portion, though they were dun.
“What on Roshar?” Kaladin asked.
Dabbid shrugged.
“The Sibling led you to this, I assume?”
Dabbid nodded.
“Navani must have sent it,” Kaladin said. “Syl, what time is it?”
“About a half hour before your meeting with the queen,” she said, looking upward toward the sky, occluded behind many feet of stone.
“Next highstorm?” Kaladin asked.
“Not sure, a few days at least. Why?”
“We’ll want to restore the dun gemstones I used in that fight with the Pursuer. Thanks for the new ones, by the way, Dabbid. We’ll need to find a way to hide the others outside to recharge though.”
Dabbid patted his chest. He’d do it.
“You seem to be doing better these days,” Kaladin said, settling down to finish feeding Teft.
Dabbid shrugged.
“Want to share your secret?” Kaladin asked.
Dabbid sat on the floor and put his hands in his lap. So Kaladin went back to his work. It proved surprisingly tiring—as he had to forcibly keep his attention from wandering to his nightmares. He was glad when, upon finishing, Syl told him the time had arrived for his check-in with Navani.
He walked to the side of the room, pressed his hand against the crystal vein, and waited for her to speak in his mind.
Highmarshal? she said a few minutes later.
“Here,” he replied. “But, since I was on my way to becoming a full-time surgeon, I’m not sure I still have that rank.”
I’m reinstating you. I managed to have one of my engineers sneak out a fabrial you might find useful. The Sibling should be able to guide you to it.
“I’ve got it already,” Kaladin said. “Though I have no idea what it’s supposed to do.”
It’s a personal lift, meant to levitate you up and down long distances. To help you travel the height of the tower.
“Interesting,” he said, glancing at the device laid out on the stone bench. “Though, I’m not one for technology, Brightness. Pardon, but I barely know how to turn on a heating fabrial.”
You’ll need to learn quickly then, Navani said. As you’ll need to replace the rubies in the fabrial with the Voidspren ones from the spanreeds you stole. We’ll need all twelve pairs. Do you see a map in with the device?
“Just a moment,” he said, digging in the sack and pulling out a small folded map. It led to a place on the twentieth floor, judging by the glyphs. “I’ve got it. I should be able to reach this place. The enemy isn’t guarding the upper floors.”
Excellent. There are weights in a shaft up there where you’ll need to install the other halves of those rubies. A mechanism on the fabrial bracer will drop one of those weights, and that force will transfer through the bracer. You’ll be pulled in whatever direction you’ve pointed the device.
“By my arm?” Kaladin asked. “That doesn’t sound comfortable.”
It isn’t. My engineer has been trying to fix that. There is a strap that winds around your arm and braces against your shoulder, which he thinks might help.
“All right…” he said. It was something to do, at least.
But fabrials? He’d always considered them toys for rich people. Though he supposed that was becoming less and less the case. Breeding projects were creating livestock with larger and larger ruby gemhearts, and fabrial creation methods were spreading. It seemed every third room had a heating fabrial these days, and spanreeds were cheap enough that even the enlisted men could afford to pay to send messages via one.
Navani coached him through replacing the rubies. Fortunately, the case of spanreeds he’d stolen included a few small tools for undoing casings. It wasn’t any more difficult than replacing the buckles on a leather jerkin.
Once it was done, he and Syl ventured out, sneaking up nine floors. He didn’t use any Stormlight; he didn’t have enough to waste. Besides, it felt good to work his body.
On the twentieth floor, the garnet light led him to the location the map had described. Inside he found the weights and the shaft, and Navani walked him through installing the matching rubies. He began to grasp how the device worked. The big weights were more than heavy enough to lift a man. Five of the rubies in his fabrial were connected to these weights, binding them together.
The other seven rubies were used to activate and control the weights. The intricate system of pulleys and mechanisms was far more complex than he could understand, but essentially it allowed him to switch to a different weight when one had dropped all
the way. He could also slow the weight’s fall or stop it completely, modulating how quickly he was being pulled.
Each weight should be able to pull you hundreds of feet before running out, Navani said via a garnet vein on the wall. These shafts plunge all the way down to the aquifers at the base of the mountain. That means you should be able to soar all the way up from the ground floor to the top of the tower using one weight.
The bad news is that once all five weights have fallen, the device will be useless until you rewind them. There is a winch in the corner; it’s an arduous process, I’m afraid.
“That’s annoying,” Kaladin said.
Yes, it is mildly inconvenient that we have to wind a crank to experience the wonder of making a human being safely levitate hundreds of feet in the air.
“Pardon, Brightness, but I can usually do it with far less trouble.”
Which is meaningless right now, isn’t it?
“I suppose it is,” he said. He looked at the fabrial, now attached to his left arm, with the straps winding around all the way to his shoulder. It was a little constrictive, but otherwise fit quite well. “So, I point it where I want to go, activate it, and I’ll get pulled that way?”
Yes. But we made the device so that it won’t move if you let go—it was too dangerous otherwise. See the pressure spring across your palm? Ease off that, and the brake on the line will activate. Do you see?
“Yes,” Kaladin said, making a fist around the bar. It had a separate metal portion wrapped around it on one side, with a spring underneath. So the harder he squeezed, the faster the device would pull him. If he let go completely, he’d stop in place.
There are two steps to the fabrial’s use. First, you have to turn the device on—conjoining the rubies. The switch you can move with your thumb? That’s for this purpose. Once you flip it, your arm will be locked into its current orientation, and won’t be able to move the bracer in any direction except forward.
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