The Way of Kings (Stormlight Archive, The)

by Brandon Sanderson

  “…the Order of the Stonewards, my lord,” the still-mounted scout was saying. “And a large number of Windrunners. All on foot.”

  “But why?” the darkeyed officer demanded. “Why are Radiants coming here? They should be fighting the devils on the front lines!”

  “My lord,” the scout said, “our orders were to return as soon as we identified them.”

  “Well, go back and find out why they’re here!” the officer bellowed, causing the scout to flinch, then turn to ride away.

  The Radiants. They were usually connected to Dalinar’s visions in one way or another. As the officer began to call commands to his attendants, telling them to prep empty bunkers for the knights, Dalinar followed the scout toward the wall. Men crowded near the kill slits there, peering out at the plain. Like those above, these wore motley uniforms that looked pieced together. They weren’t a ragged bunch, but were obviously wearing secondhand leavings.

  The scout rode through a sally port as Dalinar entered the shadow of the enormous wall, walking up to the back of a crowd of soldiers. “What is it?” he asked.

  “The Radiants,” one of the men said. “They’ve broken into a run.”

  “It’s almost like they’re going to attack,” said another. He chuckled at how ridiculous that sounded, though there was an edge of uncertainty to his voice.

  What? Dalinar thought, anxious. “Let me through.”

  Surprisingly, the men parted. As Dalinar pushed by, he could sense their confusion. He’d given the command with the authority of a highprince and a lighteyes, and they’d obeyed instinctively. Now that they saw him, they were uncertain. What was this simple guardsman doing ordering them about?

  He didn’t give them a chance to question him. He climbed onto the platform against the wall, where a rectangular kill slit looked through the wall and onto the plain. It was too small for a man to get through, but wide enough for archers to fire out. Through it, Dalinar saw that the approaching soldiers had formed a distinct line. Men and women in gleaming Shardplate charged forward. The scout pulled to a halt, looking at the charging Shardbearers. They ran shoulder to shoulder, not a single one of place. Like a crystalline wave. As they drew closer, Dalinar could see that their Plate was unpainted, but it glowed either blue or amber at the joints and across glyphs at the front, as with other Radiants he’d seen in his visions.

  “They don’t have their Shardblades out,” Dalinar said. “That’s a good sign.”

  The scout outside backed his horse up. There looked to be a good two hundred Shardbearers out there. Alethkar owned some twenty Blades, Jah Keved a similar number. If one added up all the rest in the world, there might be enough total to equal the two powerful Vorin kingdoms. That meant, so far as he knew, there were less than hundred Blades in all of the world. And here he saw two hundred Shardbearers gathered in one army. It was mind-numbing.

  The Radiants slowed, falling into a trot, then a walk. The soldiers around Dalinar grew still. The leading Radiants stopped in a line, immobile. Suddenly, others began to fall from the sky. They hit with the sound of rock cracking, puffs of Stormlight blossoming from their figures. These all glowed blue.

  Soon, there were some three hundred Radiants out on the field. They began summoning their Blades. The weapons appeared in their hands, like fog forming and condensing. It was done in silence. Their visors were down.

  “If them charging without swords was a good sign,” whispered one of the men beside Dalinar, “then what does this mean?”

  A suspicion began to rise within Dalinar, the horror that he might know what this vision was about to show him. The scout, at last unnerved, turned his horse and galloped back to the keep, screaming for the door to be opened to him. As if a little wood and stone would be a protection against hundreds of Shardbearers. A single man with Plate and Blade was almost an army unto himself, and that wasn’t accounting for the strange powers these people had.

  The soldiers pulled the sally port open for the scout. Making a snap decision, Dalinar leaped down and charged to the opening. Behind, the officer Dalinar had seen earlier was clearing a path for himself to walk up to the kill slit.

  Dalinar reached the open door, darting through it just after the scout charged back into the courtyard. Men called after Dalinar, terrified. He ignored them, running out onto the open plain. The expansive, straight wall stretched above him, like a highway up to the sun itself. The Radiants were still distant, though they’d stopped within bowshot. Transfixed by the beautiful figures, Dalinar slowed, then stopped about a hundred feet away.

  One knight stepped ahead of his companions, his brilliant cape a rich blue. His Shardblade of rippling steel had intricate carvings along the center. He held it toward the keep for a moment.

  Then he drove it point-first into the stone plain. Dalinar blinked. The Shardbearer removed his helm, exposing a handsome head with blond hair and pale skin, light as that of a man from Shinovar. He tossed the helm to the ground beside his blade. It rolled slightly as the Shardbearer made fists in his gauntlets, arms at his sides. He opened his palms wide, and the gauntlets fell free to the rocky ground.

  He turned, his Shardplate falling off his body—breastplate dropping free, greaves slipping off. Underneath, he wore a rumpled blue uniform. He stepped free of his bootlike sabatons and continued to walk away, Shardplate and Shardblade—the most precious treasures any man could own—tossed to the ground and abandoned like refuse.

  The others began to follow suit. Hundreds of men and women, driving Shardblades into the stone and then removing their Plate. The sound of metal hitting stone came like rain. Then like thunder.

  Dalinar found himself running forward. The door behind him opened and some curious soldiers left the keep. Dalinar reached the Shardblades. They sprouted from the rock like glittering silver trees, a forest of weapons. They glowed softly in a way his own Shardblade never had, but as he dashed among them, their light started to fade.

  A terrible feeling struck him. A sense of immense tragedy, of pain and betrayal. Stopping where he stood, he gasped, hand to his chest. What was happening? What was that dreadful feeling, that screaming he swore he could almost hear?

  The Radiants. They walked away from their discarded weapons. They all seemed individuals now, each walking alone despite the crowd. Dalinar charged after them, tripping over discarded breastplates and chunks of armor. He finally stumbled free of it all.

  “Wait!” he called.

  None of them turned.

  He could now see others in the distance, far off. A crowd of soldiers, not wearing Shardplate, waiting for the Radiants to return. Who were they, and why hadn’t they come forward? Dalinar He caught up to the Radiants—they weren’t walking very quickly—and grabbed one by the arm. The man turned; his skin was tan and his hair dark, like an Alethi. His eyes were of the palest blue. Unnaturally so, in fact—the irises were nearly white.

  “Please,” Dalinar said. “Tell me why you are doing this.”

  The former Shardbearer pulled his arm free and continued to walk away. Dalinar cursed, then ran into the midst of the Shardbearers. They were of all races and nationalities, dark skin and light, some with white Thaylen eyebrows, others with the skin ripples of the Selay. They walked with eyes forward, not speaking to one another, steps slow but resolute.

  “Will someone tell me why?” Dalinar bellowed. “This is it, isn’t it? The Day of Recreance, the day you betrayed mankind. But why?” None of them spoke. It was as if he didn’t exist.

  People spoke of betrayal, of the day the Knights Radiant turned their backs on their fellow men. What were they fighting, and why had they stopped? Two orders of knights were mentioned, Dalinar thought. But there were ten orders. What of the other eight?

  Dalinar fell to his knees in the sea of solemn individuals. “Please. I must know.” Nearby, some of the keep’s soldiers had reached the Shardblades—but rather than chasing after the Radiants, these men were cautiously pulling the Blades free. A few officers scram
bled out of the keep, calling for the Blades to be put down. They were soon outnumbered by men who began boiling out of side gates and rushing toward the weapons.

  “They are the first,” a voice said.

  Dalinar looked up to see that one of the knights had stopped beside him. It was the man who looked Alethi. He looked over his shoulder at the crowd gathering around the blades. Men had begun to scream at one another, everyone scrambling to get a Blade before they were all claimed.

  “They are the first,” the Radiant said, turning to Dalinar. Dalinar recognized the depth of that voice. It was the voice that always spoke to him in these visions. “They were the first, and they were also the last.”

  “Is this the Day of Recreance?” Dalinar asked.

  “These events will go down in history,” the Radiant said. “They will be infamous. You will have many names for what happened here.”

  “But why?” Dalinar asked. “Please. Why did they abandon their duty?”

  The figure seemed to study him. “I have said I that cannot be of much help to you. The Night of Sorrows will come, and the True Desolation. The Everstorm.”

  “Then answer my questions!” Dalinar said.

  “Read the book. Unite them.”

  “The book? The Way of Kings?”

  The figure turned and walked from him, joining the other Radiants as they crossed the stone plain, walking toward places unknown.

  Dalinar looked back at the melee of soldiers rushing for Blades. Many had already been claimed. There weren’t enough Blades for everyone, and some had begun raising theirs up, using them to fend off those who got too close. As he watched, a bellowing officer with a Blade was attacked by two men behind him.

  The glow from within the weapons had completely vanished.

  The killing of that officer made others bold. Other skirmishes started, men scrambling to attack those who had Blades, hoping to get one. Eyes began to burn. Screams, shouts, death. Dalinar watched until he found himself in his quarters, tied to his chair. Renarin and Adolin watched nearby, looking tense.

  Dalinar blinked, listening to the rain of the passing highstorm on the roof. “I’ve returned,” he said to his sons. “You may calm yourselves.” Adolin helped untie the ropes while Renarin stood up and fetched Dalinar a cup of orange wine.

  Once Dalinar was free, Adolin stood back. The youth folded his arms. Renarin came back, his face pale. He looked to be having one of his episodes of weakness; indeed, his legs were trembling. As soon as Dalinar took the cup, the youth sat down in a chair and rested his head in his hands.

  Dalinar sipped the sweet wine. He had seen wars in his visions before. He had seen deaths and monsters, greatshells and nightmares. And yet, for some reason, this one disturbed him more than any. He found his own hand shaking as he raised the cup for a second sip.

  Adolin was still looking at him.

  “Am I that bad to watch?” Dalinar asked.

  “The gibberish you speak is unnerving, Father,” Renarin said. “Unearthly, strange. Skewed, like a wooden building pushed to a slant by the wind.”

  “You thrash about,” Adolin said. “You nearly tipped over the chair. I had to hold it steady until you stilled.”

  Dalinar stood up, sighing as he walked over to refill his cup. “And you still think I don’t need to abdicate?”

  “The episodes are containable,” Adolin said, though he sounded disturbed. “My point was never to get you to abdicate. I just didn’t want you relying upon the delusions to make decisions about our house’s future. So long as you accept that what you see isn’t real, we can move on. No reason for you to give up your seat.”

  Dalinar poured the wine. He looked eastward, toward the wall, away from Adolin and Renarin. “I don’t accept that what I see isn’t real.”

  “What?” Adolin said. “But I thought I convinced—”

  “I accept that I’m no longer reliable,” Dalinar said. “And that there’s a chance I might be going mad. I accept that something is happening to me.” He turned around. “When I first began seeing these visions, I believed them to be from the Almighty. You have convinced me that I may have been too hasty in my judgment. I don’t know enough to trust them. I could be mad. Or they could be supernatural without being of the Almighty.”

  “How could that happen?” Adolin said, frowning.

  “The Old Magic,” Renarin said softly, still sitting.

  Dalinar nodded.

  “What?” Adolin said pointedly. “The Old Magic is a myth.”

  “Unfortunately, it is not,” Dalinar said, then took another drink of the cool wine. “I know this for a fact.”

  “Father,” Renarin said. “For the Old Magic to have affected you, you’d have had to travel to the West and seek it. Wouldn’t you?”

  “Yes,” he said, ashamed. The empty place in his memories where his wife had once existed had never seemed as obvious to him as it did at that moment. He tended to ignore it, with good reason. She’d vanished completely, and it was sometimes difficult for him to remember that he had been married.

  “These visions are not in line with what I’ve understood about the Nightwatcher,” Renarin said. “Most consider her to be just some kind of powerful spren. Once you’ve sought her out and been given your reward and your curse, she’s supposed to leave you alone. When did you seek her?”

  “It’s been many years now,” Dalinar said.

  “Then this probably isn’t due to her influence,” Renarin said.

  “I agree,” Dalinar said.

  “But what did you ask for?” Adolin said, frowning.

  “My curse and boon are my own, son,” Dalinar said. “The specifics are not important.”

  “But—”

  “I agree with Renarin,” Dalinar said, interrupting. “This is probably not the Nightwatcher.”

  “All right, fine. But why bring it up?”

  “Because, Adolin,” Dalinar said, feeling exasperated. “I don’t know what is happening to me. These visions seem far too detailed to be products of my mind. But your arguments made me think. I could be wrong. Or you could be wrong, and it could be the Almighty. Or it could be something entirely different. We don’t know, and that is why it is dangerous for me to be left in command.”

  “Well, what I said still holds,” Adolin said stubbornly. “We can contain it.”

  “No, we can’t,” Dalinar said. “Just because it has come only during highstorms in the past doesn’t mean it couldn’t expand to other times of stress. What if I were struck with an episode on the battlefield?” That was the very same reason they didn’t let Renarin ride into battle.

  “If that happens,” Adolin said, “we’ll deal with it. For now, we could just ignore—”

  Dalinar threw a hand up into the air. “Ignore? I cannot ignore something like this. The visions, the book, the things I feel—they’re changing every aspect of me. How can I rule if I do not follow my conscience? If I continue as highprince, I second-guess my every decision. Either I decide to trust myself, or I step down. I cannot stomach the thought of something in-between.”

  The room fell silent.

  “So what do we do?” Adolin said.

  “We make the choice,” Dalinar said. “I make the choice.”

  “Step down or keep heeding the delusions,” Adolin spat. “Either way we’re letting them rule us.”

  “And you have a better option?” Dalinar demanded. “You’ve been quick to complain, Adolin, which seems a habit of yours. But I don’t see you offering a legitimate alternative.”

  “I gave you one,” Adolin said. “Ignore the visions and move on!”

  “I said a legitimate option!”

  The two stared at one another. Dalinar fought to keep his anger contained. In many ways, he and Adolin were too similar. They understood one another, and that enabled them to push in places that hurt.

  “Well,” Renarin said, “what if we proved whether or not the visions were true?”

  Dalinar glanced at him.
“What?”

  “You say these dreams are detailed,” Renarin said, leaning forward with hands clasped in front of him. “What, exactly, do you see?”

  Dalinar hesitated, then gulped down the rest of his wine. For once he wished he had intoxicating violet instead of orange. “The visions are often of the Knights Radiant. At the end of each episode, someone—I think one of the Heralds—comes to me and commands me to unite the highprinces of Alethkar.”

  The room fell silent, Adolin looking disturbed, Renarin just sitting quietly.

  “Today, I saw the Day of Recreance,” Dalinar continued. “The Radiants abandoned their Shards and walked away. The Plate and Blades…faded somehow when they were abandoned. It seems such an odd detail to have seen.” He looked at Adolin. “If these visions are fantasies, then I am a great deal more clever than I once thought myself.”

  “Do you remember any specifics we could check on?” Renarin asked. “Names? Locations? Events that might be traced in history?”

  “This last one was of a place called Feverstone Keep,” Dalinar said.

  “I’ve never heard of it,” Adolin said.

  “Feverstone Keep,” Dalinar repeated. “In my vision, there was some kind of war going on near there. The Radiants had been fighting on the front lines. They withdrew to this fortress, then abandoned their Shards there.”

  “Perhaps we could find something in history,” Renarin said. “Proof that either this keep existed or that the Radiants didn’t do what you saw there. Then we’d know, wouldn’t we? If the dreams are delusions or truth?”

  Dalinar found himself nodding. Proving them had never occurred to him, in part because he had assumed they were real at the start. Once he’d started questioning, he’d been more inclined to keep the nature of the visions hidden and silent. But if he knew that he was seeing real events…well, that would at least rule out the possibility of madness. It wouldn’t solve everything, but it would help a great deal.

  “I don’t know,” Adolin said, more skeptical. “Father, you’re talking about times before the Hierocracy. Will we be able to find anything in the histories?”