“My return supersedes his distant orders,” Dalinar said. “The men will know that. Even Gavilar wouldn’t disagree.”
“Yes, but why keep him ignorant of your arrival?”
The last moon was close to setting. Not long until morning. “What do you think of my brother, Sadeas?”
“He’s exactly what we need,” Sadeas said. “Hard enough to lead a war; soft enough to be beloved during peace. He has foresight and wisdom.”
“Do you think he could do what needs to be done here?”
Sadeas fell silent. “No,” he finally said. “No, not now. I wonder if you can either. This will be more than just death. It will be complete destruction.”
“A lesson,” Dalinar whispered.
“A display. Tanalan’s plan was clever, but risky. He knew his chances of winning here depended upon removing you and your Shards from the battle.” He narrowed his eyes. “You thought those soldiers were mine. You actually believed I’d betray Gavilar.”
“I worried.”
“Then know this, Dalinar,” Sadeas said, low, his voice like stone grinding stone. “I would cut out my own heart before betraying Gavilar. I have no interest in being king—it’s a job with little praise and even less amusement. I mean for this kingdom to stand for centuries.”
“Good,” Dalinar said.
“Honestly, I worried that you would betray him.”
“I almost did, once. I stopped myself.”
“Why?”
“Because,” Dalinar said. “There has to be someone in this kingdom capable of doing what needs to be done, and it can’t be the man sitting on the throne. Continue to hold the scribes back; it will be better if my brother can reasonably disavow what we’re about to do.”
“Something will leak out soon,” Sadeas said. “Between our two armies, there are too many spanreeds. Storming things are getting so cheap, most of the officers can afford to buy a pair to manage their households from a distance.”
Dalinar strode back into the tent, Sadeas following. Oathbringer still sat where he’d stuck it into the stones, though an armorer had replaced the gemstone for him.
He pulled the Blade from the rock. “Time to attack.”
Amaram turned from where he stood with the other generals. “Now, Dalinar? At night?”
“The bonfires on the wall should be enough.”
“To take the wall fortifications, yes,” Amaram said. “But Brightlord, I don’t relish fighting down into those vertical streets in the night.”
Dalinar shared a look with Sadeas. “Fortunately, you won’t have to. Send the word for the men to prepare the oil and flaming brands. We march.”
Highmarshal Perethom took the orders and began organizing specifics. Dalinar lifted Oathbringer on his shoulder. Time to bring you home.
In under a half hour, men charged the walls. No Shardbearers led this time; Dalinar was too weak, and his Plate was in shambles. Sadeas never did like exposing himself too early, and Teleb couldn’t rush in alone.
They did it the mundane way, sending men to be crushed by stones or impaled by arrows as they carried ladders. They broke through eventually, securing a section of the wall in a furious, bloody fight.
The Thrill was an unsatisfied lump inside Dalinar, but he was wrung out, worn down. So he continued to wait until finally, Teleb and Sadeas joined the fight and routed the last of the defenders, sending them down from the walls toward the chasm of the city itself.
“I need a squad of elites,” Dalinar said softly to a nearby messenger. “And my own barrel of oil. Have them meet me inside the walls.”
“Yes, Brightlord,” the young boy said, then ran off.
Dalinar strode across the field, passing fallen men bloody and dead. They’d died almost in ranks where waves of arrows had struck. He also passed a cluster of corpses in white, where the envoy had been slaughtered earlier. Warmed by the rising sun, he passed through the now-open gates of the wall and entered the ring of stone that surrounded the Rift.
Sadeas met him there, faceplate up, cheeks even redder than normal from exertion. “They fought like Voidbringers. More vicious than last time, I’d say.”
“They know what is coming,” Dalinar said, walking toward the cliff edge. He stopped halfway there.
“We checked it for a trap this time,” Sadeas noted.
Dalinar continued forward. The Rifters had gotten the better of him twice now. He should have learned the first time. He stopped at the edge of the cliff, looking down at a city built on platforms, rising up along the widening sides of the rift of stone. It was little wonder they thought so highly of themselves as to resist. Their city was grand, a monument of human ingenuity and grit.
“Burn it,” Dalinar said.
Archers gathered with arrows ready to ignite, while other men rolled up barrels of oil and pitch to give extra fuel.
“There are thousands of people in there, sir,” Teleb said softly from his side. “Tens of thousands.”
“This kingdom must know the price of rebellion. We make a statement today.”
“Obey or die?” Teleb asked.
“The same deal I offered you, Teleb. You were smart enough to take it.”
“And the common people in there, the ones who didn’t get a chance to choose a side?”
Sadeas snorted from nearby. “We will prevent more deaths in the future by letting every brightlord in this kingdom know the punishment for disobedience.” He took a report from an aide, then stepped up to Dalinar. “You were right about the scouts who turned traitor. We bribed one to turn on the others, and will execute the rest. The plan was apparently to separate you from the army, then hopefully kill you. Even if you were simply delayed, the Rift was hoping their lies would prompt your army into a reckless attack without you.”
“They weren’t counting on your swift arrival,” Dalinar said.
“Or your tenacity.”
The soldiers unplugged barrels of oil, then began dropping them down, soaking the upper levels of the city. Flaming brands followed—starting struts and walkways on fire. The very foundations of this city were flammable.
Tanalan’s soldiers tried to organize a fight back out of the Rift, but they’d surrendered the high ground, expecting Dalinar to do as he had before, conquering and controlling.
He watched as the fires spread, flamespren rising in them, seeming larger and more … angry than normal. He then walked back—leaving a solemn Teleb—to gather his remaining elites. Captainlord Kadash had fifty for him, along with two barrels of oil.
“Follow,” Dalinar said, walking around the Rift on its east side, where the fracture was narrow enough to cross on a short bridge.
Screams below. Then cries of pain. Calls for mercy. People flooded from buildings, shouting in terror, fleeing on walkways and steps toward the basin below. Many buildings burned, trapping others inside.
Dalinar led his squad along the northern rim of the Rift until they reached a certain location. His armies waited here to kill any soldiers who tried to break out, but the enemy had concentrated their assault on the other side, then been mostly beaten back. The fires hadn’t reached up here yet, though Sadeas’s archers had killed several dozen civilians who had tried to flee in this direction.
For now, the wooden ramp down into the city was clear. Dalinar led his group down one level to a location he remembered so well: the hidden door set into the wall. It was metal now, guarded by a pair of nervous Rifter soldiers.
Kadash’s men shot them down with shortbows. That annoyed Dalinar; all of this fighting, and nothing with which to feed the Thrill. He stepped over one of the corpses, then tried the door, which was no longer hidden. It was still locked tight. Tanalan had decided to go with security instead of secrets, this time.
Unfortunately for them, Oathbringer had come home. Dalinar easily cut off the steel hinges. He stepped back as the door slammed forward onto the walkway, shaking the wood.
“Light those,” he said, pointing to the barrels. “Ro
ll them down and burn out anyone hiding inside.”
The men hurried to obey, and soon the tunnel of rock had fitful black smoke pouring from it. Nobody tried to flee, though he thought he heard cries of pain inside. Dalinar watched as long as he could, until soon the smoke and heat drove him back.
The Rift behind him was becoming a pit of darkness and fire. Dalinar retreated up the ramp to the stones above. Archers lit the final walkways and ramps behind him. It would be long before people decided to resettle here. Highstorms were one thing, but there was a more terrible force upon the land. And it carried a Shardblade.
Those screams … Dalinar passed lines of soldiers who waited along the northern rim in silent horror; many wouldn’t have been with Dalinar and Gavilar during the early years of their conquest, when they’d allowed pillaging and ransacking of cities. And for those who did remember … well, he’d often found an excuse to stop things like this before.
He drew his lips to a line, and shoved down the Thrill. He would not let himself enjoy this. That single sliver of decency he could keep back.
“Brightlord!” a soldier said, waving to him. “Brightlord, you must see this!”
Just below the cliff here—one tier down into the city—was a beautiful white building. A palace. Farther out along the walkways, a group of people fought to reach the building. The wooden walkways were on fire, and preventing their access. Shocked, Dalinar recognized Tanalan the younger from their encounter earlier.
Trying to get into his home? Dalinar thought. Figures darkened the building’s upper windows; a woman and children. No. Trying to get to his family.
Tanalan hadn’t been hiding in the saferoom after all.
“Throw a rope,” Dalinar said. “Bring Tanalan up here, but shoot down the bodyguards.”
The smoke billowing out of the Rift was growing thick, lit red by the fires. Dalinar coughed, then stepped back as his men let down a rope to the platform below, a section that wasn’t burning. Tanalan hesitated, then took it, letting Dalinar’s men haul him up. The bodyguards were sent arrows when they tried to climb up a nearby burning ramp.
“Please,” Tanalan said, clothing ashen from the smoke, as he was hauled up over the stone rim. “My family. Please.”
Dalinar could hear them screaming below. He whispered an order, and his elites pushed back the regular Kholin troops from the area, opening up a wide half-circle against the burning rift, where only Dalinar and his closest men were able to observe the captive.
Tanalan slumped on the ground. “Please…”
“I,” Dalinar said softly, “am an animal.”
“What—”
“An animal,” Dalinar said, “reacts as it is prodded. You whip it, and it becomes savage. With an animal, you can start a tempest. Trouble is, once it’s gone feral, you can’t just whistle it back to you.”
“Blackthorn!” Tanalan screamed. “Please! My children.”
“I made a mistake years ago,” Dalinar said. “I will not be so foolish again.”
And yet … those screams.
Dalinar’s soldiers seized Tanalan tightly as Dalinar turned from the man and walked back to the pit of fire. Sadeas had just arrived with a company of his own men, but Dalinar ignored them, Oathbringer still held against his shoulder. Smoke stung Dalinar’s nose, his eyes watering. He couldn’t see across the Rift to the rest of his armies; the air warped with heat, colored red.
It was like looking into Damnation itself.
Dalinar released a long breath, suddenly feeling his exhaustion even more deeply. “It is enough,” he said, turning toward Sadeas. “Let the rest of the people of the city escape out the mouth of the canyon below. We have sent our signal.”
“What?” Sadeas said, hiking over. “Dalinar—”
A loud series of cracks interrupted him. An entire section of the city nearby collapsed into the flames. The palace—and its occupants—crashed down with it, a tempest of sparks and splintering wood.
“No!” Tanalan shouted. “NO!”
“Dalinar…” Sadeas said. “I prepared a battalion below, with archers, per your orders.”
“My orders?”
“You said to ‘Kill anyone who comes out of the city and leave their bodies to rot.’ I had men stationed below; they’ve launched arrows in at the city struts, burned the walkways leading down. This city burns from both directions—from underneath and from above. We can’t stop it now.”
Wood cracked as more sections of city collapsed. The Thrill surged, and Dalinar pushed it away. “We’ve gone too far.”
“Nonsense! Our lesson won’t mean much if people can merely walk away.” Sadeas glanced toward Tanalan. “Last loose end is this one. We don’t want him getting away again.” He reached for his sword.
“I’ll do it,” Dalinar said. Though the concept of more death was starting to sicken him, he steeled himself. This was the man who had betrayed him.
Dalinar stepped closer. To his credit, Tanalan tried to leap to his feet and fight. Several elites shoved the traitor back down to the ground, though Captainlord Kadash himself was just standing at the side of the city, looking down at the destruction. Dalinar could feel that heat, so terrible. It mirrored a sense within him. The Thrill … incredibly … was not satisfied. Still it thirsted. It didn’t seem … didn’t seem it could be satiated.
Tanalan collapsed, blubbering.
“You should not have betrayed me,” Dalinar whispered, raising Oathbringer. “At least this time, you didn’t hide in your hole. I don’t know who you let take cover there, but know they are dead. I took care of that with barrels of fire.”
Tanalan blinked, then started laughing with a frantic, crazed air. “You don’t know? How could you not know? But you killed our messengers. You poor fool. You poor, stupid fool.”
Dalinar seized him by the chin, though the man was still held by his soldiers. “What?”
“She came to us,” Tanalan said. “To plead. How could you have missed her? Do you track your own family so poorly? The hole you burned … we don’t hide there anymore. Everyone knows about it. Now it’s a prison.”
Ice washed through Dalinar, and he grabbed Tanalan by the throat and held, Oathbringer slipping from his fingers. He strangled the man, all the while demanding that he retract what he’d said.
Tanalan died with a smile on his lips. Dalinar stepped back, suddenly feeling too weak to stand. Where was the Thrill to bolster him? “Go back,” he shouted at his elites. “Search that hole. Go…” He trailed off.
Kadash was on his knees, looking woozy, a pile of vomit on the rock before him. Some elites ran to try to do as Dalinar said, but they shied away from the Rift—the heat rising from the burning city was incredible.
Dalinar roared, standing, pushing toward the flames. However, the fire was too intense. Where he had once seen himself as an unstoppable force, he now had to admit exactly how small he was. Insignificant. Meaningless.
Once it’s gone feral, you can’t just whistle it back to you.
He fell to his knees, and remained there until his soldiers pulled him—limp—away from the heat and carried him to his camp.
* * *
Six hours later, Dalinar stood with hands clasped behind his back—partially to hide how badly they were shaking—and stared at a body on the table, covered in a white sheet.
Behind him in the tent, some of his scribes whispered. A sound like swishing swords on the practice field. Teleb’s wife, Kalami, led the discussion; she thought that Evi must have defected. What else could explain why the burned corpse of a highprince’s wife had been found in an enemy safehouse?
It fit the narrative. Showing uncharacteristic determination, Evi had drugged the guard protecting her. She’d snuck away in the night. The scribes wondered how long Evi had been a traitor, and if she’d helped recruit the group of scouts who had betrayed Dalinar.
He stepped forward, resting his fingers on the smooth, too-white sheet. Fool woman. The scribes didn’t know Evi well enough.
She hadn’t been a traitor—she’d gone to the Rift to plead for them to surrender. She’d seen in Dalinar’s eyes that he wouldn’t spare them. So, Almighty help her, she’d gone to do what she could.
Dalinar barely had the strength to stand. The Thrill had abandoned him, and that left him broken, pained.
He pulled back the corner of the sheet. The left side of Evi’s face was scorched, nauseating, but the right side had been down toward the stone. It was oddly untouched.
This is your fault, he thought at her. How dare you do this? Stupid, frustrating woman.
This was not his fault, not his responsibility.
“Dalinar,” Kalami said, stepping up. “You should rest.”
“She didn’t betray us,” Dalinar said firmly.
“I’m sure eventually we’ll know what—”
“She did not betray us,” Dalinar snapped. “Keep the discovery of her body quiet, Kalami. Tell the people … tell them my wife was slain by an assassin last night. I will swear the few elites who know to secrecy. Let everyone think she died a hero, and that the destruction of the city today was done in retribution.”
Dalinar set his jaw. Earlier today, the soldiers of his army—so carefully trained over the years to resist pillaging and the slaughter of civilians—had burned a city to the ground. It would ease their consciences to think that first, the highlady had been murdered.
Kalami smiled at him, a knowing—even self-important—smile. His lie would serve a second purpose. As long as Kalami and the head scribes thought they knew a secret, they’d be less likely to dig for the true answer.
Not my fault.
“Rest, Dalinar,” Kalami said. “You are in pain now, but as the highstorm must pass, all mortal agonies will fade.”
Dalinar left the corpse to the ministrations of others. As he departed, he strangely heard the screams of those people in the Rift. He stopped, wondering what it was. Nobody else seemed to notice.
Yes, that was distant screaming. In his head, maybe? They all seemed children to his ears. The ones he’d abandoned to the flames. A chorus of the innocent pleading for help, for mercy.