The Way of Kings (Stormlight Archive, The)

by Brandon Sanderson

  Lamaril waved Gaz over, so he reluctantly approached. Then he took a sphere out of his pouch and passed it over. A topaz mark. He hated losing it. He always hated losing money.

  “You owe me twice as much as this,” Lamaril noted, raising the sphere up to look through it as it sparkled in the sunlight.

  “Well, that’s all you’ll get for now. Be glad you get anything.”

  “Be glad I’ve kept my mouth shut,” Lamaril said lazily, leaning back against his post. It was one that marked the edge of the lumberyard.

  Gaz gritted his teeth. He hated to pay, but what else could he do? Storms take him. Raging storms take him!

  “You have a problem, it seems,” Lamaril said.

  At first, Gaz thought he meant the half payment. The lighteyed man nodded toward Bridge Four’s barracks.

  Gaz eyed the bridgemen, unsettled. The youthful bridgeleader barked an order, and the bridgemen raced the span of the lumberyard in a jog. He already had them running in time with one another. That one change meant so much. It sped them up, helped them think like a team.

  Could this boy actually have military training, as he’d once claimed? Why would he be wasted as a bridgeman? Of course, there was that shash brand on his forehead….

  “I don’t see a problem,” Gaz said with a grunt. “They’re fast. That’s good.”

  “They’re insubordinate.”

  “They follow orders.”

  “His orders, perhaps.” Lamaril shook his head. “Bridgemen exist for one purpose, Gaz. To protect the lives of more valuable men.”

  “Really? And here I thought their purpose was to carry bridges.”

  Lamaril gave him a sharp look. He leaned forward. “Don’t try me, Gaz. And don’t forget your place. Would you like to join them?”

  Gaz felt a spike of fear. Lamaril was a very lowly lighteyes, one of the landless. But he was Gaz’s immediate superior, a liaison between bridge crews and the higher-ranked lighteyes who oversaw the lumberyard.

  Gaz looked down at the ground. “I’m sorry, Brightlord.”

  “Highprince Sadeas holds an edge,” Lamaril said, leaning back against his post. “He maintains it by pushing us all. Hard. Each man in his place.” He nodded toward the members of Bridge Four. “Speed is not a bad thing. Initiative is not a bad thing. But men with initiative like that boy’s are not often happy in their position. The bridge crews function as they are, without need for modification. Change can be unsettling.”

  Gaz doubted that any of the bridgemen really understood their place in Sadeas’s plans. If they knew why they were worked as pitilessly as they were—and why they were forbidden shields or armor—they likely would just cast themselves into the chasm. Bait. They were bait. Draw the Parshendi attention, let the savages think they were doing some good by felling a few bridges’ worth of bridgemen every assault. So long as you took plenty of men, that didn’t matter. Except to those who were slaughtered.

  Stormfather, Gaz thought, I hate myself for being a part of this. But he’d hated himself for a long time now. It wasn’t anything new to him. “I’ll do something,” he promised Lamaril. “A knife in the night. Poison in the food.” That twisted his insides. The boy’s bribes were small, but they were all that let him keep ahead of his payments to Lamaril.

  “No!” Lamaril hissed. “You want it seen that he was really a threat? The real soldiers are already talking about him.” Lamaril grimaced. “The last thing we need is a martyr inspiring rebellion among the bridgemen. I don’t want any hint of it; nothing our highprince’s enemies could take advantage of.” Lamaril glanced at Kaladin, jogging past again with his men. “That one has to fall on the field, as he deserves. Make certain it happens. And get me the rest of the money you owe, or you’ll soon find yourself carrying one of those bridges yourself.”

  He swept away, forest-green cloak fluttering. In his time as a soldier, Gaz had learned to fear the minor lighteyes the most. They were galled by their closeness in rank to the darkeyes, yet those darkeyes were the only ones they had any authority over. That made them dangerous. Being around a man like Lamaril was like handling a hot coal with bare fingers. There was no way to avoid burning yourself. You just hoped to be quick enough to keep the burns to a minimum.

  Bridge Four ran by. A month ago, Gaz wouldn’t have believed this possible. A group of bridgemen, practicing? And all it seemed to have cost Kaladin was a few bribes of food and some empty promises that he would protect them.

  That shouldn’t have been enough. Life as a bridgeman was hopeless. Gaz couldn’t join them. He just couldn’t. Kaladin the lordling had to fall. But if Kaladin’s spheres vanished, Gaz could just as easily end up as a bridgeman for failing to pay Lamaril. Storming Damnation! he thought. It was like trying to choose which claw of the chasmfiend would crush you.

  Gaz continued to watch Kaladin’s crew. And still that darkness waited for him. Like an itch that couldn’t be scratched. Like a scream that couldn’t be silenced. A tingling numbness that he could never be rid of.

  It would probably follow him even into death.

  “Bridge up!” Kaladin bellowed, running with Bridge Four. They raised the bridge over their heads while still moving. It was harder to run this way, holding the bridge up, rather than resting it on the shoulders. He felt its enormous weight on his arms.

  “Down!” he ordered.

  Those at the front let go of the bridge and ran out to the sides. The others lowered the bridge in a quick motion. It hit the ground awkwardly, scraping the stone. They got into position, pretending to move it across a chasm. Kaladin helped at the side.

  We’ll need to practice on a real chasm, he thought as the men finished. I wonder what kind of bribe it would take for Gaz to let me do that.

  The bridgemen, finished with their mock bridge run, looked toward Kaladin, exhausted but excited. He smiled at them. As a squadleader those months in Amaram’s army, he’d learned that praise should be honest, but it should never be withheld.

  “We need to work on that set-down,” Kaladin said. “But overall, I’m impressed. Two weeks and you’re already working together as well as some teams I trained for months. I’m pleased. And proud. Go get something to drink and take a break. We’ll do one or two more runs before work detail.”

  It was stone-gathering duty again, but that was nothing to complain about. He’d convinced the men that lifting the stones would improve their strength, and had enlisted the few he trusted the most to help gather the knobweed, the means by which he continued to—just barely—keep the men supplied with extra food and build his stock of medical supplies.

  Two weeks. An easy two weeks, as the lives of bridgemen went. Only two bridge runs, and on one they’d gotten to the plateau too late. The Parshendi had escaped with the gemheart before they’d even arrived. That was good for bridgemen.

  The other assault hadn’t been too bad, by bridgeman numbers. Two more dead: Amark and Koolf. Two more wounded: Narm and Peet. A fraction of what the other crews had lost, but still too many. Kaladin tried to keep his expression optimistic as he walked to the water barrel and took a ladle from one of the men, drinking it down.

  Bridge Four would drown in its own wounded. They were only thirty strong, with five wounded who drew no pay and had to be fed out of the knobweed income. Counting those who’d died, they’d taken nearly thirty percent casualties in the weeks he’d begun trying to protect them. In Amaram’s army, that rate of casualties would have been catastrophic.

  Back then, Kaladin’s life had been one of training and marching, punctuated by occasional frenzied bursts of battle. Here, the fighting was relentless. Every few days. That kind of thing could—would—wear an army down.

  There has to be a better way, Kaladin thought, swishing the lukewarm water in his mouth, then pouring another ladle on his head. He couldn’t continue to lose two men a week to death and wounds. But how could they survive when their own officers didn’t care if they lived or died?

  He barely kept himself fr
om throwing the ladle into the barrel in frustration. Instead, he handed it to Skar and gave him an encouraging smile. A lie. But an important one.

  Gaz watched from the shadow of one of the other bridgeman barracks. Syl’s translucent figure—shaped now like floating knobweed fluff—flitted around the bridge sergeant. Eventually, she made her way over to Kaladin, landing on his shoulder, taking her female form.

  “He’s planning something,” she said.

  “He hasn’t interfered,” Kaladin said. “He hasn’t even tried to stop us from having the nightly stew.”

  “He was talking to that lighteyes.”

  “Lamaril?”

  She nodded.

  “Lamaril’s his superior,” Kaladin said as he walked into the shade of Bridge Four’s barrack. He leaned against the wall, looking over at his men by the water barrel. They talked to one another now. Joked. Laughed. They went out drinking together in the evenings. Stormfather, but he never thought he’d be glad that the men under his command went drinking.

  “I didn’t like their expressions,” Syl said, sitting down on Kaladin’s shoulder. “Dark. Like thunderclouds. I didn’t hear what they were saying. I noticed them too late. But I don’t like it, particularly that Lamaril.”

  Kaladin nodded slowly.

  “You don’t trust him either?” Syl asked.

  “He’s a lighteyes.” That was enough.

  “So we—”

  “So we do nothing,” Kaladin said. “I can’t respond unless they try something. And if I spend all of my energy worrying about what they might do, I won’t be able to solve the problems we’re facing right now.”

  What he didn’t add was his real worry. If Gaz or Lamaril decided to have Kaladin killed, there was little he could to do to stop them. True, bridgemen were rarely executed for anything other than failing to run their bridge. But even in an “honest” force like Amaram’s, there had been rumors of trumped-up charges and fake evidence. In Sadeas’s undisciplined, barely regulated camp, nobody would blink if Kaladin—a shash-branded slave—were strung up on some nebulous charge. They could leave him for the highstorm, washing their hands of his death, claiming that the Stormfather had chosen his fate.

  Kaladin stood up straight and walked toward the carpentry section of the lumberyard. The craftsmen and their apprentices were hard at work cutting lengths of wood for spear hafts, bridges, posts, or furniture.

  The craftsmen nodded to Kaladin as he passed. They were familiar with him now, used to his odd requests, like pieces of lumber long enough for four men to hold and run with to practice keeping cadence with one another. He found a half-finished bridge. It had eventually grown out of that one plank that Kaladin had used.

  Kaladin knelt down, inspecting the wood. A group of men worked with a large saw just to his right, slicing thin rounds off a log. Those would probably become chair seats.

  He ran his fingers along the smooth hardwood. All mobile bridges were made of a kind of wood called makam. It had a deep brown color, the grain almost hidden, and was both strong and light. The craftsmen had sanded this length smooth, and it smelled of sawdust and musky sap.

  “Kaladin?” Syl asked, walking through the air then stepping onto the wood. “You look distant.”

  “It’s ironic how well they craft these bridges,” he said. “This army’s carpenters are far more professional than its soldiers.”

  “That makes sense,” she said. “The craftsmen want to make bridges that last. The soldiers I listen to, they just want to get to the plateau, grab the gemheart, and get away. It’s like a game to them.”

  “That’s astute. You’re getting better and better at observing us.”

  She grimaced. “I feel more like I’m remembering things I once knew.”

  “Soon you’ll hardly be a spren at all. You’ll be a little translucent philosopher. We’ll have to send you off to a monastery to spend your time in deep, important thoughts.”

  “Yes,” she said, “like how to best get the ardents there to accidentally drink a mixture that will turn his mouth blue.” She smiled mischievously.

  Kaladin smiled back, but kept running his finger across the wood. He still didn’t understand why they wouldn’t let bridgemen carry shields. Nobody would give him a straight answer on the question. “They use makam because it’s strong enough for its weight to support a heavy cavalry charge,” he said. “We should be able to use this. They deny us shields, but we already carry one on our shoulders.”

  “But how would they react if you try that?”

  Kaladin stood. “I don’t know, but I also don’t have any other choice.”

  Trying this would be a risk. A huge risk. But he’d run out of nonrisky ideas days ago.

  “We can hold it here,” Kaladin said, pointing for Rock, Teft, Skar, and Moash. They stood beside a bridge turned up on its side, its underbelly exposed. The bottom was a complicated construction, with eight rows of three positions accommodating up to twenty-four men directly underneath, then sixteen sets of handles—eight on each side—for sixteen more men on the outside. Forty men, running shoulder to shoulder, if they had a full complement.

  Each position underneath the bridge had an indentation for the bridgeman’s head, two curved blocks of wood to rest on his shoulders, and two rods for handholds. The bridgemen wore shoulder pads, and those who were shorter wore extras to compensate. Gaz generally tried to assign new bridgemen to crews based on their height.

  That didn’t hold for Bridge Four, of course. Bridge Four just got the leftovers.

  Kaladin pointed to several rods and struts. “We could grab here, then run straight forward, carrying the bridge on its side to our right at a slant. We put our taller men on the outside and our shorter men on the inside.”

  “What good would that do?” Rock asked, frowning.

  Kaladin glanced at Gaz, who was watching from nearby. Uncomfortably close. Best not to speak of why he really wanted to carry the bridge on its side. Besides, he didn’t want to get the men’s hopes up until he knew if it would work.

  “I just want to experiment,” he said. “If we can shift positions occasionally, it might be easier. Work different muscles.” Syl frowned as she stood on the top of the bridge. She always frowned when Kaladin obscured the truth.

  “Gather the men,” Kaladin said, waving to Rock, Teft, Skar, and Moash. He’d named the four as his subsquad commanders, something that bridgemen didn’t normally have. But soldiers worked best in smaller groups of six or eight.

  Soldiers, Kaladin thought. Is that how I think of them?

  They didn’t fight. But yes, they were soldiers. It was too easy to underestimate men when you considered them to be “just” bridgemen. Charging straight at enemy archers without shields took courage. Even when you were compelled to do it.

  He glanced to the side, noticing that Moash hadn’t left with the other three. The narrow-faced man had dark green eyes and brown hair flecked with black.

  “Something wrong, soldier?” Kaladin asked.

  Moash blinked in surprise at the use of the word, but he and the others had grown to expect all kinds of unorthodoxy from Kaladin. “Why did you make me leader of a subsquad?”

  “Because you resisted my leadership longer than almost any of the others. And you were flat-out more vocal about it than any of them.”

  “You made me a squad leader because I refused to obey you?”

  “I made you squad leader because you struck me as capable and intelligent. But beyond that, you weren’t swayed too easily. You’re strong-willed. I can use that.”

  Moash scratched his chin, with its short beard. “All right then. But unlike Teft and that Horneater, I don’t think you’re a gift straight from the Almighty. I don’t trust you.”

  “Then why obey me?”

  Moash met his eyes, then shrugged. “Guess I’m curious.” He moved off to gather his squad.

  What in the raging winds… Gaz thought, dumbfounded as he watched Bridge Four charge past. What had pos
sessed them to try carrying the bridge to the side?

  It required them to clump up in an odd way, forming three rows instead of five, awkwardly clutching the underside of the bridge and holding it off to their right. It was one of the strangest things he’d ever seen. They could barely all fit, and the handholds weren’t made for carrying the bridge that way.

  Gaz scratched his head as he watched them pass, then held out a hand, stopping Kaladin as he jogged by. The lordling let go of the bridge and hurried up to Gaz, wiping his brow as the others continued running. “Yes?”

  “What is that?” Gaz said, pointing.

  “Bridge crew. Carrying what I believe is…yes, it’s a bridge.”

  “I didn’t ask for lip,” Gaz snarled. “I want an explanation.”

  “Carrying the bridge over our heads gets tiring,” Kaladin said. He was a tall man, tall enough to tower over Gaz. Storm it, I will not be intimidated! “This is a way to use different muscles. Like shifting a pack from one shoulder to the other.”

  Gaz glanced to the side. Had something moved in the darkness?

  “Gaz?” Kaladin asked.

  “Look, lordling,” Gaz said, looking back to him. “Carrying it overhead may be tiring, but carrying it like that is just plain stupid. You look like you’re about to stumble over one another, and the handholds are terrible. You can barely fit the men.”

  “Yes,” Kaladin said more softly. “But a lot of the time, only half of a bridge crew will survive a bridge run. We can carry it back this way when there are fewer of us. It will let us shift positions, at least.”

  Gaz hesitated. Only half a bridge crew…

  If they carried the bridge like that on an actual assault, they’d go slowly, expose themselves. It could be a disaster, for Bridge Four at least.

  Gaz smiled. “I like it.”

  Kaladin looked shocked. “What?”

  “Initiative. Creativity. Yes, keep practicing. I’d very much like to see you make a plateau approach carrying the bridge that way.”

  Kaladin narrowed his eyes. “Is that so?”