The Way of Kings Prime

by Brandon Sanderson

  He did attack Crossguard too early, Dalenar reminded himself. That was one error. Whoever it is that leads this invading army, he can make mistakes. The trap isn’t inescapable yet.

  “And if Teth-Kanar is besieged too?” Echathen said.

  “Then we will die,” Dalenar said. “We can only hope that the Vedens weren’t able to infiltrate that far—they would have had to risk sending a force dangerously close to Crossguard to get to Teth-Kanar. We will also have to hope that Kholinar can hold out long enough for us to defeat the main Veden force.”

  He didn’t add the obvious—that if they didn’t defeat the main Veden force, Kinae and the rest of the upper Aleth nobility would be executed.

  “The second letter, please,” Dalenar said to the scribe.

  “It reads: ‘My dear Lord Dalenar, I write this in the hopes that you might retain some measure of influence over my husband. Though you two have come to arms recently, you must know the level of respect with which he regards you.

  “‘My lord, I am deeply afraid. I feel weak admitting this, but I don’t know to whom else I can turn. The force chasing us must belong to Talshekh Davar, and its cohesion means that he has undoubtedly slain my brother, Ahven Vedenel. My son’s life is in great danger. Not only is Ahrden the heir to the Aleth throne, but he is also now the rightful ruler of the Three Houses. Talshekh will have to make certain that the boy is . . .”

  The scribe trailed off.

  “What?” Dalenar asked.

  “I apologize, my lord,” she said. “The writing is smudged. It must have gotten wet. I think it says ‘Will have to make certain that the boy is killed, for Ahrden is a threat to his stability.’

  “It continues: ‘I have asked—even pled—with my Lord Elhokar to let me take Ahrden and flee. There are those who would hide us. We needn’t stay with the main bulk of the army, but could ride ahead and seek refuge in Khardinar, or perhaps find passage to Thalenah. Elhokar, however, insists on keeping his son with him during these dangerous times.

  “‘Please, my lord. Send a request to Elhokar. Persuade him that he must not let the Kholin line die here. He must let me flee.”

  The scribe looked up. “It is signed ‘Your queen, Lady Nanavah Vedenel.’ The words are written in a very hasty hand, my lord. I do not think she was in a . . . completely solid state of mind when she penned them.”

  Dalenar nodded thoughtfully. He could see the woman behind the words—a terrified, uncertain girl. Nanavah had come far during the last year, but before that she had displayed a spoiled immaturity and unwillingness to perform her duties as queen. She wasn’t ready to face the possibility that being Elhokar’s wife might very well mean her death.

  “Do you have your writing tools with you?” he asked the scribe.

  The scribe nodded. “They’re outside, my lord,” she said.

  “Fetch them,” Dalenar requested.

  “You intend to do as she asks?” Echathen asked curiously as the scribe left.

  Dalenar nodded. “I need to send Elhokar a message anyway and complain of his actions today. Not that it will stop him from doing whatever the winds tell him, of course. Still, perhaps I can compose a letter that will make him agree that Teth-Kanar is the place to make our stand.”

  “Don’t tell him you plan to fight there,” Echathen said, reclining. “Tell him you plan to get a ship at the port, then flee to Pralir. He’ll want to go there for certain.”

  Dalenar frowned. “He’s not that selfish. He wouldn’t leave his men behind to die.”

  Echathen shrugged. “I think you’d be surprised.”

  Dalenar frowned. However, when he composed the letter, he did as Echathen had suggested.

  chapter 76

  Jasnah 17

  The men found out about the impending battle at Kholinar, of course, and it gave them the apprehensive excitement of an untested force. They understood that by the next evening they would be lamenting injuries and deaths, yet for the moment such things were only possibilities. Odds of thrown chips, the turn of a Numerologist’s soothsaying glyphward. Until the battle began, the men could imagine honor and excitement, victories won and bravery proven.

  Jasnah was more pragmatic. Not only was she naturally that way, but she had much experience—thanks to her brother and father—with warfare. She knew both losses and victories, and understood that the two often felt hauntingly similar. Men would die at her command. True, many of them knew exactly what they were doing—Aneazer’s force, while untested in large-scale battle, had the mindset of a mercenary force. Many of the other men, however, were more idealistic. They had come, not truly at her beck, but at the call of the man they thought a Herald.

  A man Jasnah feared would fail them.

  Jasnah watched Taln as the army went about its morning preparations, getting ready to march the short distance to Kholinar and spring her trap upon the Vedens camped there. Taln had barely spoken to her over the last three days, and when he met her eyes, she saw the confused pain therein. He confronted his own insanity, and he did it for her.

  She wasn’t certain what brought her more shame: the knowledge that he suffered so for her sake, or the worry that asking him to question himself would destroy her army. She still needed him at its head. While traveling from Riemak, they had gathered even more followers. News of Lord Aneazer’s acceptance of the Herald Talenel had provided vast credibility to her claims, for he had been the man to squash the last three false Herald uprisings. The Herald’s section was now just as large as Aneazer’s section of the force. It had nearly thirty-five hundred people, many gathered from Aneazer’s own villages and by his suggestion. These men followed Taln, not her or Meridas. Without the banner of Heraldship, there was a good chance they would not fight.

  She knew she shouldn’t consider such things. She had confronted Taln for his own good. Yet she worried. What if he did overcome his hallucinations? He would probably denounce himself before the army, and in doing so destroy it as surely as an enemy ambush. She would never be able to take Kholinar with just Aneazer’s forces.

  A part of her didn’t care. That part—indignant that she would put her own lies before Taln’s well-being—wished desperately for him to admit he was no Herald, for it would remove the great barrier of delusion that kept them apart. Yet the voice that whispered such things was the same underdeveloped piece of her that had always warned her not to manipulate others. She had always quieted it in the name of a better, more dominant good. What was the betrayal of a minor court ally if it gained her the knowledge she needed to protect the crown? What was the death of one squad of soldiers on a battlefield when their unwitting sacrifice protected a tensquad others? What was the mind of one man, when compared to the cohesion of a vital fighting force?

  That was the guilt she bore. It was not helped by seeing what she had done to him already. Where he had once stared forward with firm confidence, he now looked down in uncertainty. Where he had once declared, he now remained quiet. With misery, she realized that his stubborn self-​confidence—the thing that had frustrated her so often—was also the very thing that had made Taln so compelling to her. Seeing him lost and indecisive was painful enough to make her wince whenever he looked her direction.

  What right did she have to ask him to change? Who was she to make such a demand, especially when she followed it with only the hint of a promise? He saw himself as the holy protector of an entire world, and she had asked him to give that up. For her.

  She sighed, stretching and standing to the side as a group of soldiers dismantled her tent. Though Aneazer had purchased her a relatively nice talla in one of the towns they had passed, for now she wore trousers and one of her tough seasilk sencoats. It was odd how quickly she had grown to prefer the loose, comfortable clothing. When she had tried on the talla, she had found herself trying to walk with a full stride, and had nearly tripped in surprise. The constrictive dress had made her feel short-of-breath and trapped, as if she were bound in tight ropes. She would have to grow
accustomed to tallahs again, eventually—but for now she could maintain that wearing her sensible clothing was necessary, lest she ruin her only luxurious outfit.

  As she waited, she saw Meridas and Aneazer leave the command tent, and allowed herself a moment of seething frustration. Meridas was still firm in his declarations that a woman did not belong in the command tent. Though they had adopted her plan for attacking the Veden force—and even came to her for suggestions on strategy—they forbade her entrance into the daily planning meetings. While most of the things they discussed were minor issues, it was annoying to be left out. Besides, she knew more than they did. While the men had heard recitations from the great and historic strategic works, she had actually read the books—and there was a difference, especially since she had read not only the dictations by the generals, but the often more-enlightening comments added by their wives and daughters in the Justification.

  Meridas bid Aneazer farewell, saying something in a low, almost suspicious, voice before parting. Jasnah thinned her eyes, watching the two go about their morning duties. Their allegiance was another item of great concern. She trusted Meridas about as much as she trusted the winds not to blow, and Aneazer’s reputation was proof enough of his nature. Both men would do what best gained them power, and there was little she could do to check them. She had worked to build Taln’s reputation, and therefore power, among Aneazer’s troops, and she had encouraged her guards to make friends with those in Aneazer’s personal bodyguard. Her resources were, unfortunately, very limited.

  Meridas noticed her watching, and unfortunately decided to stroll her direction. He barked a few orders at attendants, sending the men to do his will, and approached her alone.

  “Lady Jasnah,” he said with a panderer’s smile. “I had hoped you would wear Lord Aneazer’s gift this day, since we might enter Kholinar by nightfall. It wouldn’t do for the court to see you dressed so, lest they mistake you for a stableboy.”

  “I shall change once we obtain victory, Lord Meridas,” Jasnah replied flatly.

  “Of course,” he said, glancing around. “I don’t see our resident deity nearby. What shall you do without him to amuse you?”

  Jasnah didn’t reply, instead folding her arms and adopting an icy glare.

  “Of course,” Meridas noted, looking back at her with eyes hiding a violent jealousy, “there will be another highstorm tomorrow morning. The two of you can just run off then and amuse yourselves.”

  Jasnah started. That night, on the highlands. You were seen asking after him, then left your guards and went to find him alone. There would have been talk. Of course Meridas knows about it.

  “I thought I told you to be discreet,” Meridas said in a low voice.

  “I was worried, so I went to see where he was,” Jasnah said. “Nothing more.”

  “Of course,” Meridas said.

  She gritted her teeth, hissing slightly. “Go!” she snapped, pointing. “Leave me.”

  His eyes flashed with anger, and he looked at her with . . . satisfaction. Jasnah paused, pushing aside her feelings of revulsion. There was something in his eyes, something he probably didn’t mean to reveal.

  “No matter,” Meridas said. “This will be over soon anyway.” He stalked away, leaving her feeling somehow soiled by the entire conversation.

  Jasnah stood for a moment, forcing herself to focus on the oddity she had sensed in his words. “Kemnar?” she requested.

  “I am here,” he said, stepping forward from his almost unnoticed position beside the working tent soldiers. Having him back was such a wind-blessed relief that she had stopped worrying about releasing him from service. She needed him too much, for the moment at least.

  “Meridas is planning something,” Jasnah said.

  “Of course he is,” Kemnar said.

  “Something specific,” she said. “I need to know what it is. I need a list of any commands he and Aneazer have contrived in their planning councils over the last three days. Take Lhan to scribe for you, and ask around. I need to know any changes they’ve made to the army’s structure or orders, no matter how insignificant, and I need to know them before we attack this afternoon.”

  “Yes, my lady,” Kemnar said, already moving to do as she bid.

  This time it felt different. She would have thought that war would be familiar to her by now. Her first tastes of battle had come during her childhood, when her father and his brothers had fought against Jarnah the Tyrant. By then, Jarnah had already conquered most of Roshar. His mysterious allegiance with the Shin clans had allowed him to roll across the Second Peninsula like a raging highstorm. Once Davar, Vedenel, and Prallah had fallen, Alethkar had found itself threatened from both the south and the east.

  This she knew from the histories. Her memories of those days were different—memories highlighted by the emotions she had seen on her father’s stout face. Fear, confusion, and worry. Every nation on Roshar, even the island kingdom of Thalenah, had fallen to Jarnah’s conquering—what hope did Alethkar have?

  But then Dalenar had slain the Tyrant himself in single combat. Jarnah’s empire had fallen upon itself. Several of his generals had tried to lead the armies, but fracturing and rebellion had turned them against one another. Jasnah’s first true experiences with war hadn’t come for another several years. Those days, once Jarnah’s armies had been defeated, her father had sought to reestablish Alethkar’s historic boundaries. She had been young during the first Prallah Wars, not even eighteen, but her father had quickly realized his daughter’s tactical ability. Never a man who had cared much for propriety, Nolhonarin had used her from that day onward. It had been a simple matter for her to transfer that service to Elhokar, when he took his war of justice to the Pralir highlands.

  Why should this battle feel so different from the others? She sat nervously in her saddle, waiting as the runners did one final scout of the enemy camp. The unfamiliar horse shuffled beneath her, and Jasnah wished for a litter, for she had little experience with riding. The army waited with barely-contained vigor. Perhaps that was the reason for her unsettlement. Before, her strategies had always been given at others’ behest. They had been the ones venturing men’s lives, and ultimately the guilt of failure had been theirs to bear.

  That was it. She had gathered these men, and for the first time the respons-ibility of their lives was hers. Meridas insisted on controlling battle command, and Taln’s was the banner under which they rode, but they were Jasnah’s men. They would die because she had brought them here.

  Her horse stirred, and a sudden touch on her leg made her jump. She looked down to find Kemnar and Brother Lhan standing beside her. Had she been that distracted?

  “I’m sorry it took us so long, Lady Jasnah,” Kemnar said, nodding for Lhan to produce a sheet of paper, scribbled with lines of text. “But here it is—a list of the commands Meridas and Aneazer made over the last few days, with the more unusual ones listed at the top.”

  Jasnah took the proffered sheet, noting the spear Lhan carried in his other hand. She held up the sheet, scanning the list, as she spoke. “Brother Lhan, you are not to take part in the battle.”

  “Excuse me?” the monk asked.

  “You will withdraw to the command tent,” Jasnah said. “You are one of a few people in this force who can read, and I am not going to let you die on that battlefield.”

  Lhan glanced away with bitter eyes. “Well,” he said, “my streak for proving myself useless continues unabated. Thank you, my lady—one wouldn’t wish to break such a delightful streak of laziness. I suppose I’ll go find a place to nap while everyone else dies.”

  “You have too much knowledge and training, Lhan,” Jasnah said. “Regardless of your newfound desire to be heroic, you cannot be risked. Do as I command.”

  Lhan sighed, then stalked off. For the first time Jasnah remarked on how young he was—barely twenty, if that old. His monk’s robes, mixed with his strange ability to see to the truth of a person’s soul, made him seem far older. />
  Kemnar bowed and retreated to the battle preparations. Jasnah let them both leave, turning to scan the list they had worked to prepare. What had she expected to find? There had to be some clue to Meridas’s plans manifest in his orders—whatever his schemes, he could hardly actuate them without giving commands.

  Most of the list was unremarkable. Squads had been assigned to separate camp duties; changes had been made in personnel groupings to better mix the untrained with the skilled. Men had been sent to hunt for food supplies to supplement what the Awakener created. Meridas had made orders as to how the tents were to be arranged, and who was to pack them each day. Once again, Jasnah remarked on what she had noticed so long ago. When Meridas had first taken command of that first hundred men from Marcabe, he had displayed far more knowledge about the workings of an army than a simple merchant should possess.

  There wasn’t much on the list that was of any interest. She almost tossed it away before she made the connection. Meridas had made many orders about troop locations for the upcoming battle, obviously intentioned on placing Aneazer’s better-trained soldiers in key positions. One of those changes, though unremarkable at first glance, suddenly gave her a chill of realization.

  Meridas had replaced Taln’s inexperienced honor guard with men from Aneazer’s own personal guard. Jasnah recognized some of the names as Aneazer’s most loyal and well-trained soldiers. Ostensibly, it was a sign of respect for Taln, putting the Herald under the protection of the finest soldiers in the army.

  Jasnah saw the truth. She remembered vividly the jealousy in Meridas’s eyes and his conspiratory familiarity with Aneazer.

  Taln would not survive the battle.

  I have to warn him. Thankful for an excuse to leave the horse behind, Jasnah slid out of her saddle and went looking for the madman. She found him sitting alone, close to the front of the army, yet somehow apart from them. He looked up when she approached, and she could see something in his eyes: resolve.