Rhythm of War (9781429952040)

by Brandon Sanderson

  He couldn’t blame everything he’d done on the Thrill. That had been Dalinar in those boots, holding that weapon and glorying in destruction. That had been Dalinar lusting to kill. If he let himself go out and fight again, he knew he’d realize a part of him still loved it.

  And so, he had to remain here. Find other ways of solving his problems. He stepped out of his personal dwelling, another small stone hut in Laqqi, their command city.

  He took a deep breath, hoping the fresh air would clear his mind. The village was now fully fortified against both storms and attacks, with high-flying scout posts watching the land all around and Windrunners darting in to deliver reports.

  I must get better with my powers, Dalinar thought. If I had access to the map I could make with Shallan, we might be able to see exactly what is happening at Urithiru.

  It would not help, the Stormfather said in his mind, a sound like distant thunder. I cannot see the tower. Whatever weakens the Windrunners when they draw close weakens me too, so the map would not reveal the location. However, I could show it to you. Perhaps you can see better than I.

  “Show me?” Dalinar asked, causing Szeth—his omnipresent shadow—to glance at him. “How?”

  You can ride the storm with me, the Stormfather said. I have given others this privilege on occasion.

  “Ride the storm with you?” Dalinar said.

  It is like the visions that Honor instructed me to grant, only it is now. Come. See.

  “Martra,” Dalinar said, looking to the scribe who had been assigned to him today. “I might act odd for a short time. Nothing is wrong, but if I am not myself when my next appointment begins, please make them wait.”

  “Um … yes, Brightlord,” she said, hugging her ledger, eyes wide. “Should I, um, get you a chair?”

  “That would be a good idea,” Dalinar said. He didn’t feel like being closed up inside. He liked the scent of the air, even if it was too muggy here, and the sight of the open sky.

  Martra returned with a chair and Dalinar settled himself, facing eastward. Toward the Origin, toward the storms—though his view was blocked by the large stone stormbreak.

  “Stormfather,” he said. “I’m—”

  He became the storm.

  Dalinar soared along the front of the stormwall, like a piece of debris. No … like a gust of wind blowing with the advent of the storm. He could see—comprehend—far more than when he’d flown under Windrunner power.

  It was a great deal to take in. He surged across rolling hills with plants growing in the valleys between them. From up high it looked like a network of brown islands surrounded by greenery—each and every lowland portion filled to the brim with a snarl of underbrush. He’d never seen anything quite like it, the plants unfamiliar to him, though their density did faintly remind him of the Valley where he had met Cultivation.

  He didn’t have a body, but he turned and saw that he towed a long shadow. The storm itself.

  When the Windrunner flew on my winds, he zipped about, the Stormfather said, and Dalinar felt the sounds all around him. You simply think. You complain about meetings, but you are well suited to them.

  “I grow,” Dalinar said. “I change. It is the mark of humanity, Stormfather, to change. A prime tenet of our religion. When I was Kaladin’s age, I suspect I would have acted as he.”

  We approach the mountains, the Stormfather said. Urithiru will come soon. Be ready to watch.

  A mountain range started to grow up to Dalinar’s right, and he realized where they must be—blowing through Triax or Tu Fallia, countries with which he had little experience. These weren’t the mountains where he’d find Urithiru, not yet. So he experimented with motion, soaring closer to the overgrown valleys.

  Yes … this landscape was alien to him, the way the underbrush snarled together so green. Full of grass, broad leaves, and other stalks, all woven together with vines and bobbing with lifespren. The vines were a netting tying it all together, tight against storms.

  He saw curious animals with long tentacles for arms and leathery skin instead of chitin. Malleable, they easily squeezed through holes in the underbrush and found tight pockets in which to hide as the stormwall hit. Strange that everything would be so different when it wasn’t that far from Alethkar. Only a little trip across the Tarat Sea.

  He tried to hang back to inspect one of the animals.

  No, the Stormfather said. Forward. Ever forward.

  Dalinar let himself be encouraged onward, sweeping across the hills until he reached a place where the underbrush had been hollowed out to build homes. These valleys weren’t so narrow or deep that flooding would be a danger, and the buildings were built on stilts a few feet high anyway. They were grown over by the same vine netting, the edges of the buildings melding with the underbrush to borrow its strength.

  Once, this village had likely been in an enviable location—protected by the surrounding plants. Unfortunately, as he blew past, he noted multiple burned-out buildings, the rest of the village in shambles.

  The Everstorm. Dalinar’s people had adapted to it; large cities already had walls on all sides, and small villages had been able to rely upon their government’s stockpiles to help them survive this change in climate. But small, isolated villages like this had taken the brunt of the new storm with nobody to help. How many such places existed on Roshar, hovering on the edge of extinction?

  Dalinar was past the place in a few heartbeats, but the memory lingered. Over the last two years, what cities and towns hadn’t been broken by the sudden departure of the parshmen had been relentlessly attacked by storm or battle. If they won—when they won—the war, they would have a great deal of work to do in rebuilding the world.

  As he continued his flight, he saw something else discouraging: a pair of foragers trapped while making their way back toward their home. The ragged men huddled together in a too-shallow ravine. They wore clothing of thick woven fibers that looked like the rug material that came out of Marat, and their spears weren’t even metal.

  “Take mercy upon them,” Dalinar said. “Temper your fury, Stormfather.”

  It is not fury. It is me.

  “Then protect them,” Dalinar said as the stormwall hit, plunging the ill-fated men into darkness.

  Should I protect all who venture out into me?

  “Yes.”

  Then do I stop being a storm, stop being me?

  “You can be a storm with mercy.”

  That defies the definition and soul of a storm, the Stormfather said. I must blow. I make this land exist. I carry seeds; I birth plants; I make the landscape permanent with crem. I provide Light. Without me, Roshar withers.

  “I’m not asking you to abandon Roshar, but to protect those men. Right here. Right now.”

  I … the Stormfather rumbled. It is too late. They did not survive the stormwall. A large boulder crushed them soon after we began speaking.

  Dalinar cursed, an action that translated as crackling lightning in the nearby air. “How can a being so close to divinity be so utterly lacking in honor?”

  I am a storm. I cannot—

  You are not merely a storm! Dalinar bellowed, his voice changing to rumbles of thunder. You are capable of choice! You hide from that, and in so doing, you are a COWARD!

  The Stormfather did not respond. Dalinar felt him there, subdued—like a petulant child scolded for their foolishness. Good. Both Dalinar and the Stormfather were different from what they once had been. They had to be better. The world demanded that they be better.

  Dalinar soared up higher, no longer wanting to see specifics—in case he was to witness more of the Stormfather’s unthinking brutality. Eventually they reached snow-dusted mountains, and Dalinar soared to the very top of the storm. Lately the storms had been creeping higher and higher in the sky—something people wouldn’t normally notice, but which was quite obvious in Urithiru.

  It is natural, the Stormfather said. A cycle. I will go higher and higher until I am taller than the tower, the
n the next few storms will lower. The highstorm did this before the tower existed.

  There seemed to be a timidity to the words, uncharacteristic of the Stormfather. Perhaps Dalinar had rattled him.

  Soon he saw the tower approaching.

  You can see it? the Stormfather said. The details?

  “Yes,” Dalinar said.

  Look quickly. We will pass rapidly.

  Dalinar steered himself as a gust of wind, fixating upon Urithiru. Nothing seemed overtly wrong with it. There wasn’t anyone up on the Cloudwalk level, but with the storms growing higher, that wouldn’t be advisable anyway.

  “Can we go inside?” Dalinar asked as they approached.

  You may, the Stormfather said. I cannot go inside, just as I cannot infuse spheres indoors. When a piece splits off, it is no longer me. You will need to quickly rejoin, or the vision will end.

  Dalinar picked the lowest accessible balcony in the tower’s east-jutting lobes, up on the fourth tier, and lowered himself until he was right on target. As the storm passed, he soared in through the open balcony into the quiet hallway beyond.

  It was over too swiftly. A rush through a dark hallway until he found the southern diagonal corridor, where he tried to reach the ground floor, but Dalinar was suddenly pulled out another balcony without having seen any signs of life. The stormwall passed by to crest the mountains and continue on toward Azir and his body.

  “No,” Dalinar said. “We need to look again.”

  You must continue forward. Momentum, Dalinar.

  “Momentum kept me doing terrible things, Stormfather. Momentum alone is not a virtue.”

  We cannot do what you ask.

  “Stop making excuses and try for once!” Dalinar said, provoking lightning around him. He resisted the push to continue at the front and—though it caused the Stormfather to groan with fits of thunder—Dalinar moved into the inner portions of the storm. The black chaos behind the stormwall.

  He was wind blowing against wind, a man swimming against a tide, but he pushed all the way back to Urithiru. The Stormfather grumbled, but Dalinar didn’t sense pain from the spren. Just … surprise. As if the Stormfather were genuinely curious about what Dalinar had managed to do.

  It was difficult to stay in place, but he hovered outside the first tier, searching for anything alarming. The fury of the wind tugged at him. The Stormfather rumbled, and lightning flashed.

  There. Dalinar felt something. A … faint Connection, like when he learned someone’s language. His Surgebinding, his powers, drew him through the wind around the outside base of the tower—until he found something remarkable. A single figure, almost invisible in the darkness, clinging to the outside of the tower on the eighth level.

  Kaladin Stormblessed.

  Dalinar could not fathom what had brought the Windrunner to expose himself like this in a storm, but here he was. Holding on tightly to a ledge. His clothing was ragged, and he was wounded—bleeding from numerous cuts.

  “Blood of my fathers,” Dalinar whispered. “Stormfather, do you see him?”

  I … feel him, the Stormfather said. Through you. He seems to be waiting for the center of the storm, where his spheres and Stormlight will renew.

  Dalinar drew close to the young man, who had buried his head into his shoulder for protection. He was soaked through, a piece of his shirt slapping against the stone over and over.

  “Kaladin?” Dalinar shouted. “Kaladin, what has happened?”

  The young man didn’t move. Dalinar calmed himself, resisting the furious winds, and drew power from the soul of the storm.

  KALADIN, he said.

  Kaladin shifted, turning his head. His skin had gone pale, his hair matted and whipped into rain-drenched knots. Storms … he looked like a dead man.

  WHAT HAS HAPPENED? Dalinar demanded as the storm.

  “Singer invasion,” Kaladin whispered into the wind. “Navani captured. The tower on lockdown. Other Radiants are all unconscious.”

  I WILL FIND HELP.

  “Radiant powers don’t work. Except mine. Maybe those of a Bondsmith. I’m fighting. I’m … trying.”

  LIFE BEFORE DEATH.

  “Life…” Kaladin whispered. “Life … before…” The man’s eyes fluttered closed. He sagged, going limp, and dropped off the wall, unconscious.

  NO. Dalinar gathered the winds, and with a surge of strength, used them to hurl Kaladin up and over the ledge of the balcony, onto the eighth floor of the tower.

  That strained his abilities, and at last the tide grabbed Dalinar and forced him toward the front of the storm. As it happened, he was ejected from the vision and found himself in Emul, sitting in his chair. An honor guard of soldiers had arrived, forming a circle around him so people couldn’t gawk. Though it had been a long time since Dalinar had been taken involuntarily in a vision, he appreciated the gesture.

  He shook himself, rising to stand. Nearby, Martra held up her notebook. “I wrote down everything you said and did! Like Brightness Navani used to. Did I do it right?”

  “Thank you,” Dalinar said, scanning what she’d written. It seemed he had spoken out loud, like when in one of the old visions. Only, Martra hadn’t heard the parts where he’d spoken as the storm.

  One of the guards coughed, and Dalinar noticed one of the others gawking at him. The youth turned away immediately, blushing.

  Because I was reading, Dalinar thought, handing back the notebook. He looked at the sky, expecting to see stormclouds—though here the highstorm would still be hours away from this region.

  Stormfather, he thought. The tower was invaded. Our worst fears are confirmed. The enemy controls Urithiru. Storms, that felt painful to acknowledge. First Alethkar, then the tower? And Navani captured?

  Now he knew why the enemy had thrown away Taravangian. Maybe even the entire army here in Emul. They’d been sacrificed to keep Dalinar occupied.

  “Go to Teshav,” Dalinar said to Martra. “Have her gather the monarchs and my highlords. I need to call an emergency meeting. Cancel everything else I was to do today.”

  The young woman yelped, perhaps at being given such an important task. She ran on his orders immediately. The soldiers parted at Dalinar’s request, and he looked toward the sky again.

  Stormfather, did you hear me?

  You have hurt me, Dalinar. This is the second time you have done so. You push against our bond, forcing me to do things that are not right.

  I push you to stretch, Dalinar said. That is always painful. Did you hear what Stormblessed told me?

  Yes, he said. But he is wrong. Your powers will not work at Urithiru. It seems … they have turned the tower’s protections against us. If that is true, you would need to be orders of magnitude stronger, more experienced than you are, to open a perpendicularity there. You’d have to be strong enough to overwhelm the Sibling.

  I need to say more oaths, Dalinar said. I need to better understand what I can do. My training goes too slowly. We need to find a way to speed it up.

  I cannot help you. Honor is dead. He was the only one who knew what you could do, in full. He was the only one that could have trained you.

  Dalinar growled in frustration. He began to pace the unworked stone in front of his warcamp house.

  Kaladin, Shallan, Jasnah, Lift … all of them picked up on their powers naturally, Dalinar said. But here I am, many months after our Bonding, and I have barely progressed.

  You are something different from them, the Stormfather replied. Something greater, more dangerous. But also more complicated. There has never been another like you.

  Distant thunder. Drawing closer.

  Except … the Stormfather said.

  Dalinar looked up as a thought struck him. Likely the same one that had occurred to the Stormfather.

  There was another Bondsmith.

  * * *

  A short time later, an out-of-breath Dalinar arrived at a small building in the far northern part of the camp. People raced about, preparing for the imminent st
orm, but he ignored them. Instead he burst into the small building, surprising a woman tending to a hulking man seated on the floor, bent forward, muttering to himself.

  The woman leaped to her feet, reaching for the sword she wore at her side. She was of a difficult race to distinguish—maybe Azish, with that dark skin tone. But her eyes were wrong—like a Shin person. These two were beings trapped outside of time. Creatures almost as ancient as Roshar. The Heralds Shalash and Talenelat.

  Dalinar ignored the woman’s threatening pose and strode forward, seizing her by the shoulders. “There were ten of you. Ten Heralds. All were members of an order of Knights Radiant.”

  “No,” Shalash said. “We were before the Radiants. They were modeled upon us, but we were not in their ranks. Except for Nale.”

  “But there was one of you who was a Bondsmith,” Dalinar said. “Ishi, Herald of Luck, Herald of Mysteries, Binder of Gods.”

  “Creator of the Oathpact,” Shalash said, forcing herself out of Dalinar’s grip. “Yes, yes. We all have names like that. Useless names. You should stop talking about us. Stop worshipping us. Stop painting us.”

  “He’s still alive,” Dalinar said. “He was unchained by the oaths. He would understand what I can learn to do.”

  “I’m sure,” Shalash said. “If any—except me—are still sane, it would be him.”

  “He’s near here,” Dalinar said, in awe. “In Tukar. Not more than a short flight southeast of this very town.”

  “Isn’t there an army in the way?” Shalash said. “Isn’t pushing the enemy back—crushing them into Ishar’s army—our main goal right now?”

  “That’s what Jasnah and our army are doing,” Dalinar said. “But I have another task. I need to find a way to speak to the god-priest, then convince him to help me rescue Urithiru.”