Teft saw Lyn glowing, then dashed over and started cursing—but they were “good” Teft curses. He grabbed her by the arm and towed her toward Kaladin.
Skar took in a long, satisfied breath. Well, that was two he’d helped so far, counting Rock. He … he could live with that, couldn’t he?
He strolled over to the drink station and got another cup. “What is this foul stuff, Rock?” he asked. “You didn’t mistake the washing water for tea, did you?”
“Is old Horneater recipe,” he said. “Has proud tradition.”
“Like skipping?”
“Like formal war dance,” he said. “And hitting annoying bridgemen on head for not showing proper respect.”
Skar turned around and leaned one hand on the table, watching Lyn’s enthusiasm as her squad of scouts ran up to her. He felt good about what he’d done—strangely good. Excited, even.
“I think I’m going to have to get used to smelly Horneaters, Rock,” Skar said. “I’m thinking of joining your support team.”
“You think I will let you anywhere near cook pot?”
“I might not ever learn to fly.” He squished the part of him that whimpered at that. “I need to come to terms with the fact. So, I’ll have to find another way to help out.”
“Ha. And the fact that you are glowing with Stormlight right now is not at all consideration in decision?”
Skar froze. Then he focused on his hand, right in front of his face, holding a cup. Tiny wisps of Stormlight curled off it. He dropped the cup with a cry, digging from his pocket a couple of dun chips. He’d given his practice gemstone to Lyn.
He looked up at Rock, then grinned stupidly.
“I suppose,” Rock said, “I can maybe have you wash dishes. Though you do keep throwing my cups on ground. Is not proper respect at all…”
He trailed off as Skar left him, running for the others and whooping with excitement.
Indeed, we admire his initiative. Perhaps if you had approached the correct one of us with your plea, it would have found favorable audience.
I am Talenel’Elin, Herald of War. The time of the Return, the Desolation, is near at hand. We must prepare. You will have forgotten much, following the destruction of the times past.
Kalak will teach you to cast bronze, if you have forgotten this. We will Soulcast blocks of metal directly for you. I wish we could teach you steel, but casting is so much easier than forging, and you must have something we can produce quickly. Your stone tools will not serve against what is to come.
Vedel can train your surgeons, and Jezrien will teach you leadership. So much is lost between Returns. I will train your soldiers. We should have time. Ishar keeps talking about a way to keep information from being lost following Desolations. And you have discovered something unexpected. We will use that. Surgebinders to act as guardians … Knights …
The coming days will be difficult, but with training, humanity will survive. You must bring me to your leaders. The other Heralds should join us soon.
I think I am late, this time. I think … I fear, oh God, that I have failed. No. This is not right, is it? How long has it been? Where am I? I … am Talenel’Elin, Herald of War. The time of the Return, the Desolation, is near at hand.…
Jasnah trembled as she read the madman’s words. She turned over the sheet, and found the next one covered in similar ideas, repeated over and over.
This couldn’t be a coincidence, and the words were too specific. The abandoned Herald had come to Kholinar—and had been dismissed as a madman.
She leaned back in her seat and Ivory—full-sized, like a human—stepped over to the table. Hands clasped behind his back, he wore his usual stiff formal suit. The spren’s coloring was jet black, both clothing and features, though something prismatic swirled on his skin. It was as if pure black marble had been coated in oil that glistened with hidden color. He rubbed his chin, reading the words.
Jasnah had rejected the nice rooms with balconies on the rim of Urithiru; those had such an obvious entrance for assassins or spies. Her small room at the center of Dalinar’s section was far more secure. She had stuffed the ventilation openings with cloth. The airflow from the hallway outside was adequate for this room, and she wanted to make sure nobody could overhear her by listening through the shafts.
In the corner of her room, three spanreeds worked tirelessly. She had rented them at great expense, until she could acquire new ones of her own. They were paired with reeds in Tashikk that had been delivered to one of the finest—and most trustworthy—information centers in the princedom. There, miles and miles away, a scribe was carefully rewriting each page of her notes, which she had originally sent to them to keep safe.
“This speaker, Jasnah,” Ivory said, tapping the sheet she’d just read. Ivory had a clipped, no-nonsense voice. “This one who said these words. This person is a Herald. Our suspicions are true. The Heralds are, and the fallen one still is.”
“We need to find him,” Jasnah said.
“We must search Shadesmar,” Ivory said. “In this world, men can hide easily—but their souls shine out to us on the other side.”
“Unless someone knows how to hide them.”
Ivory looked toward the growing stack of notes in the corner; one of the pens had finished writing. Jasnah rose to change the paper; Shallan had rescued one of her trunks of notes, but two others had gone down with the sinking ship. Fortunately, Jasnah had sent off these backup copies.
Or did it matter? This sheet, encrypted by her cipher, contained lines and lines of information connecting the parshmen to the Voidbringers. Once, she’d slaved over each of these passages, teasing them from history. Now their contents were common knowledge. In one moment, all of her expertise had been wiped away.
“We’ve lost so much time,” she said.
“Yes. We must catch what we have lost, Jasnah. We must.”
“The enemy?” Jasnah asked.
“He stirs. He angers.” Ivory shook his head, kneeling beside her as she changed the sheets of paper. “We are naught before him, Jasnah. He would destroy my kind and yours.”
The spanreed finished, and another started writing out the first lines of her memoirs, which she’d worked on intermittently throughout her life. She’d thrown aside a dozen different attempts, and as she read this latest one, she found herself disliking it as well.
“What do you think of Shallan?” she asked Ivory, shaking her head. “The person she’s become.”
Ivory frowned, lips drawing tight. His sharply chiseled features, too angular to be human, were like those of a roughed-out statue the sculptor had neglected to finish.
“She … is troubling,” he said.
“That much hasn’t changed.”
“She is not stable.”
“Ivory, you think all humans are unstable.”
“Not you,” he said, lifting his chin. “You are like a spren. You think by facts. You change not on simple whims. You are as you are.”
She gave him a flat stare.
“Mostly,” he added. “Mostly. But it is, Jasnah. Compared to other humans, you are practically a stone!”
She sighed, standing up and brushing past him, returning to her writing desk. The Herald’s ravings glared at her. She settled down, feeling tired.