The Way of Kings Prime

by Brandon Sanderson

  The madman himself sat near the far wall, looking over his list of provisions. Meridas stood chuckling with his young nobleman adjuncts, who were becoming more and more comfortable with the idea that a Parshen was paying them favor. They probably realized that he only did so because there was no one better, but their noblemen’s instincts wouldn’t let them pass up the opportunity to pander.

  Only one man didn’t seem even slightly nervous about their impending flight. Brother Lhan sat with his back to the stone wall, using only a single cushion for comfort. He noticed her regarding him and smiled, rising and strolling over to her chair, then seating himself on the stone floor beside it.

  “Lady Jasnah,” he said, his affability seeming strange within the dank confines of the stormshelter.

  “Brother Lhan,” she replied.

  “I just wanted to say that I appreciate the new boots,” he said, smiling down at the pair she had purchased for him out of the group’s funds. “I dare say, they are the finest present I’ve received from a heretic in my entire life.”

  Jasnah raised an eyebrow at his lack of decorum. She suspected that Taln’s favor of the man came, in part, because they were both incurably blunt with their opinions.

  Lhan smiled happily.

  “You seem to accept my supposed heresy without much concern,” Jasnah noted dryly.

  “Supposed, Lady Jasnah?” Lhan asked. “I believe I’ve read one of the essays you wrote during your days at the New House. Any man who only ‘supposes’ that you reject Vorinism might as well climb out into the Bellow and ‘suppose’ that he’ll get wet.”

  Jasnah frowned. “You won’t persuade me to change my views, monk,” she said. “More zealous men than yourself have worked on me to little avail.”

  “Oh, I’m not ‘working on you,’ my lady,” Lhan assured. “I’m just trying to amuse myself.”

  “How relieving,” she answered, turning away from the short monk, glancing over at Taln again. The madman was staring at the wall across from him, his eyes lost to memories and his own thoughts.

  “He sees things—and remembers things—that scare him,” Lhan said in a quiet voice.

  Jasnah glanced away from Taln, looking back down toward the monk. “What kind of things?”

  Lhan shook his head. “He won’t tell me. I don’t think he really ever confronts them himself. I think, maybe, they are why he acts like he does.”

  “Insane?”

  Lhan frowned. “I don’t know. He’s not like other madmen I’ve known, Lady Jasnah. Perhaps he’s not really mad at all.”

  “You believe him?” Jasnah asked incredulously.

  “Believe is a strong word, my lady,” Lhan said. “Do I think he’s some sort of deity? No, I don’t believe that. But, what are these Heralds that we worship, really? Beings sent by the Almighty, creatures whose purposes are to protect and to warn. Throughout lore, the Elins have cared for mankind, going where the Almighty cannot, lest his tenfold perfection destroy the flawed world around him. The Heralds have been heroes and sages, bringing peace when possible, and leading war when inevitable. I wonder—is this a path we should dissuade a man from emulating?”

  “He doesn’t try to emulate, Lhan,” Jasnah said. “He thinks he is one of them.”

  Lhan shrugged. “If the end result is the man who sits on the stone over there, then I think that we could be far worse treated.”

  Jasnah paused, then spoke in a more hushed tone. “It’s not that simple, Lhan. You were there, that evening of the duels. You saw his eyes; you know how he can get.”

  She waited, her silence prompting him to grudgingly nod his head. “Yes, I saw.”

  “He frightened me that day,” Jasnah said. “Frightened me more than, perhaps, I should admit. Now that I have seen him fight, I’m frightened even more. I saw him kill two Shardbearers in the space of three heartbeats, Lhan. I saw him slaughter nearly a tenset of men with casual grace. Mix that with what I’ve seen in his eyes . . . the uncertainty, the instability . . . What will happen then, Lhan? Will anyone in this group be able to stop him?”

  Lhan shifted uncomfortably, and Jasnah felt shame at her words. She wanted to tell herself that Taln would never do something that horrible. Yet she couldn’t be certain. At times, he seemed so stable, so stalwartly wise. Then he would mention one of the other Heralds, if only in passing, and she would remember that glint in his eyes. Could anyone truly trust such a man?

  Jasnah shivered as she looked at Taln. She sensed something else from him, something unrelated to wisdom or madness. At times, when he stared off like he did at the moment, he didn’t seem like soldier, lunatic, or Herald. He just seemed . . . lonely. Alone, like Jasnah felt when she would admit the emotion to herself.

  “Is there nothing you can do for him?” she asked quietly.

  “My lady,” Lhan said seriously, “one of the first things I learned at Peacehome was that there was little I could do to help anyone. At best, I can know when to listen and know when to speak; when to comfort, and when to annoy. Even if I were better at such things, I don’t know if anyone could understand how to help Taln. He’s a special case. With normal madmen, there’s little to do in the way of ‘curing;’ but you can help them understand how to fit themselves into regular society.

  “With Taln, I don’t think that’s necessary. He understands society—in fact, he seems rather adept at finding his place and doing well by it. I don’t know what to tell you. Perhaps he will confront what he hides, and will realize that he doesn’t need to be a ‘Herald’ to protect those around him. Or perhaps he will continue on as he is, using the crutch of madness to keep from facing those images that haunt him. That decision, unfortunately, is left to him—or, more appropriately, to whether or not his mind is capable of recognizing it as a decision at all.”

  Lhan let the words hang between them, and a moment later Jasnah realized that the sounds of wind above had ceased. Sure enough, a pounding came on the door a few moments later, followed by a voice telling them that the Bellow had passed.

  Remnants of rockbuds formed the bulk of the refuse. Broken shells, limp stalks torn from their purchase, and mashed leaves lay scattered across the village. The fragments must have been carried with the storm for miles, for the hills immediately surrounding Marcabe had been cleared for farming.

  Mixed with the scattered pieces of foliage, of course, were other scraps that showed a human touch. Pieces of stormshutters, strips of leather, and even fragments of worked stone were littered about, most laying morosely in vast pools of crom-clouded water. Village peasants moved through the wreckage, picking through the broken scraps for anything worthy of salvage.

  Jasnah had seen far worse. Ral Eram lay exposed to highstorms on the side of the mountainface. Even its mighty walls and clever positioning didn’t make up for the lack of a lait valley, and many of its houses were lavish, with expensive woods and rugs. If such a home’s stormshutters broke, the Bellow found a plentitude of delicate items upon which to expend its wrath.

  Here, in Marcabe, few of the buildings seemed to have suffered any serious damage—though a couple of older homes had finally given into the elements, stone walls or roofs collapsing upon themselves. Hopefully the occupants had been smart enough to realize the danger, and had spent the Bellow inside the common stormshelter.

  “Well?” Taln asked, climbing up the stormshelter steps and pausing beside her.

  Jasnah nodded. “Let’s be going, then. Gather our things.”

  Taln waved for Kemnar and his soldiers, then ducked inside the inn to gather their packs. Jasnah stood waiting. Her new clothing felt . . . uncomfortable. Unnatural. She wore pants divided for a masculine stride—like trousers, though they maintained some semblance of femininity by remaining relatively loose and flowing. She wore a sencoat instead of a cloak. The garment—essentially a cloak with sleeves—was far more practical than her delicate feminine cloaks. It was sturdy, barely embroidered, and designed to be easily tied closed in case of a storm or chill
—which would be common, since they were to travel mostly at night. Beneath the sencoat and tucked into her pants, her shirt was barely distinguishable from that of a man.

  She had four other outfits similar to it. They weren’t indecent—such clothing had been worn by Kanaran women for centuries in places such as Lakhenran and even Jah Keved. However, Alethkar was far more conservative. For an Aleth noblewoman, especially one so closely related to the king, to wear such things . . . well, it probably wouldn’t be quite a scandal, but it would certainly earn her some gossip in the court.

  No one from court can see you, Jasnah reminded herself. Still, she wished she had given into Meridas’s clothing suggestions as opposed to Taln’s. Even after she had made the decision to walk, Meridas had suggested more traditional clothing, while Taln had pushed for brutal practicality.

  He displayed such as he left the inn, a large pack on his back. He dropped a similar pack beside her, and she didn’t even have to ask to realize that he expected her to carry it. Hers was far smaller than his, true, but she had assumed that agreeing to walk would be enough. Still, she didn’t argue. She stood quietly, expecting someone else to make her objection for her. And he did.

  “Surely you jest?” Meridas asked pointedly.

  Jasnah turned with a smile, then was surprised to see that Meridas wasn’t looking at her, but at the large pack Taln was holding out for him to carry.

  “If you want to drink or eat on this trip,” Taln said, “you’ll need to carry some food. We’re going too far, with too little expectation of relief, to let anyone go without helping.”

  Meridas sneered at the pack, but accepted it. Despite her own frustrations, Jasnah was amused to think how out-of-place his rich clothing would look with the utilitarian brown pack strapped on his back. Meridas’s two attendants received their own packs without complaint, now that their master had acceded to the necessity.

  Taln looked over their small group, nodding to himself. Then he gathered up a set of captured spears and began distributing them, one per person, even to those who were already wearing weapons.

  “You’ll appreciate them as walking staves, if nothing else,” Taln said before anyone could object. “And we might have need of them. All right, we ready to go?”

  “Of course not,” Meridas said. “We have to wait for the others.”

  Taln froze. “Others?” he asked. “There are no others.”

  “Indeed there are,” Meridas said. “Lady Jasnah ordered me to gather them. Do you not remember?”

  “What?” Jasnah demanded, speaking even before Taln could voice his own question.

  “Surely you remember, my lady,” Meridas said smoothly—this was an argument he had been anticipating. “It was while you were deciding on new garments, two days before. You told me that, if I wished, I could bring men to help in Lord Elhokar’s war efforts.”

  “I was talking about Tenin and Chathan,” Jasnah said.

  “Ah,” Meridas said. “You did not make that clear. I’m afraid I may have done something rash in promising the others they could join us, then.”

  Jasnah opened her mouth to ask, but closed it as they began to arrive. Men, both young and old, gathered around the inn. Tenset upon tenset of them came, all bearing a weapon of some sort—spears both crude and fine, axes for the wealthiest, cudgels for the poorest. They wore their own packs, but most looked laughable compared to Taln’s well-planned, carefully-organized supplies.

  “I apologize, my lady,” Meridas said as the men continued to arrive. “I gave them my oath, and that of the king, trusting on what you had said to me. I promised them that they could join us in liberating Alethkar from our enemies.”

  Taln stepped up beside her, his face hard with anger.

  “What?” Jasnah asked quietly, so only he could hear. “What is he doing? There must be nearly a hundred men here. I thought it was decided we were to travel by stealth!”

  “He never wanted to,” Taln said. “He wanted to go straight north.”

  “He’d intentionally sabotage us for the sake of his pride?” Jasnah asked.

  Taln shook his head. “No, this is about something greater. This is about power, not just pride. Before, the only soldiers in the group were your guards. Meridas just changed that. He’s made himself an army.”

  A short distance away, Meridas smiled as he regarded his ‘troops.’ Some of them were from the original refugee group, but many were from the village. “Think, Lady Jasnah,” he declared, “and I believe you shall see this is for the best. Why ride to our king’s warning with just a couple of soldiers, when we could bring a hundred men instead!”

  “And of our need for haste?” Jasnah demanded.

  “They are young, able men,” Meridas said. “And there really aren’t so many of them to be bulky. We can move as quickly as before. Besides, we have sent messengers.”

  “And our pursuers?” Taln demanded.

  Meridas raised an eyebrow. “If you recall, madman, most of us still disbelieve that pursuit comes as quickly as your paranoia indicates. We’re a good four weeks march from Ral Eram. We will be gone long before enemies arrive. And if they send horsemen, we now have the numbers to resist them. If they send Shardbearers . . . well, we’ll distract them, and you can just attack them from behind with your usual flair.”

  Taln sighed, turning to Jasnah. “We can’t take them.”

  “Leaving them would make an Oathbreaker of Meridas,” Jasnah said, “and by association myself, since he acts on my orders.”

  “Oaths and intricacies of honor are not reasons to risk a kingdom’s safety,” Taln said.

  “You don’t care about the kingdom,” Jasnah reminded. “You just want to get to the Holy City.”

  “True,” Taln said. “But I’d rather get there alive. You think this fluff will be of help?”

  Jasnah glanced at the troops, then at Meridas, and felt a sudden swelling of shame. Meridas should never have been able to surprise her this way.

  What is wrong with you lately? she thought angrily at herself. Ever since the attack on Ral Eram, you’ve been missing things—important things.

  There was time to ponder her deficiencies later. At the moment, she needed to make a decision. Honor or no, she could order Meridas to leave the men behind. The good of Alethkar came first.

  Yet Jasnah hesitated to disperse the men. She studied them, and she was impressed by the resolve she saw in their eyes. They were a rag-tag mix, true, but they had honor. These men might have avoided military service during the Pralir campaign or Elhokar’s attack on Crossguard, but now that an enemy had invaded, they came willing to serve. They had heard of the slaughter at Ral Eram and they knew, as she did, that this was one war they could fight confident that their side was in the right. Could she deny them the opportunity to serve?

  “Meridas does have a point,” Jasnah said to Taln. “These men will be of use when we reach my brother. He will need fresh troops.”

  “They’re untrained,” Taln pointed out.

  “Most rural men in Alethkar are at least marginally skilled in the spear and formations,” Jasnah said. “Weren’t you supposed to have set up that little suggestion, several centuries back?”

  Taln gave her a thin-eyed look, then regarded the troop of would-be soldiers. “This is ridiculous,” he said. “We’ll have traded one group for another nearly as large.”

  “We’ll have traded the weak, young, wounded, and female for potential soldiers,” Jasnah said, growing more confident in her decision.

  “You’re actually going to consider this?”

  Jasnah nodded. One word from Meridas’s earlier comments stuck in her mind: paranoid. Was Taln really imagining this ‘pursuit’ he supposedly heard in the caverns beneath Ral Eram? He continually spoke of the coming of the Stormshades, warning that all of Roshar was in danger of destruction. She wanted to trust his judgement, but that look in his eyes at the duels, when he had faced her, when she had thought—for just a moment—he would grab a weap
on and cut down every person in the room, nobleman, servant, and noblewoman alike . . .

  When the truth surfaced, she knew she would rather have a hundred armed men at her back and face Taln’s pursuit then pass up the soldiers. Perhaps she had spent too long at war in Prallah, or maybe it was the suspicious, distrustful nature that Elhokar seemed so fond of claiming she had. Either way, she made her decision.

  “We take them,” she said.

  Taln held her eyes, but he did not glare. Finally, he nodded. “We can’t leave for several more hours, then. We’ll need to spend some of your horse money to buy pushcarts and supplies for all these men.”

  It was dark by the time they left Marcabe. That wasn’t a problem in itself—the Dwelling was high in the sky during the summer months, and the intense collection of stars provided fine light for marching.

  As the first hours of the march progressed, Jasnah took a serious look at herself. She had decided to bring the hundred men, but she was still angry at herself for letting Meridas maneuver her into the position of having to decide. She simply didn’t give the man enough credit—and that would have to stop.

  Unfortunately, her underestimation of Meridas was a sign of a greater problem. Ever since she’d left the palace comforts behind, she’d had trouble controlling her surroundings. As she trudged along beneath the starlit sky, Jasnah was forced to admit her deficiencies.

  She had commanded armies. She was a master of tactics, both on the battlefield and in the political court. Yet she had never done this before—she had never been forced to walk across stone hills beside regular men. Even during the Pralir campaign, her place had been one of comfort. She commanded the court, true, but she was also dependent upon it.

  With everything she knew removed, she found herself grasping toward whatever flimsy reminders she could devise. Meridas’s offer of pretty clothing had tempted her not because of its luxury, but because of what that luxury represented—comfort, familiarity, and control.