Lightning from the storm lit the city red.
Focus. She had to focus on what she could do, not what she had failed to do. First, she had to see that her uncle didn’t get himself killed fighting a useless battle. Second, she needed to help evacuate Thaylen City; she had already warned Urithiru to prepare for refugees.
Both these goals would wait a short time as she dealt with a matter even more pressing.
“The facts align,” Ivory said. “The truth that has always been, will now soon manifest to all.” He rode upon the high collar of her dress, tiny, holding on with one hand. “You are correct. A traitor is.”
Jasnah undid the buttons on her safehand sleeve and pinned it back, exposing the gloved hand underneath. In preparation, she’d also worn a scout’s yellow and gold havah, with shorter skirts slit at the sides and front, trousers underneath. Sturdy boots.
She turned out of the path of another group of cursing soldiers and strode up the steps to the doorway of the temple of Pailiah’Elin. True to the information she’d been given, she found Renarin Kholin kneeling on the floor inside, head bowed. Alone.
A spren rose from his back, bright red, shimmering like the heat of a mirage. A crystalline structure, like a snowflake, though it dripped light upward toward the ceiling. In her pouch, she carried a sketch of the proper spren of the Truthwatchers.
And this was something different.
Jasnah put her hand to the side, then—taking a deep breath—summoned Ivory as a Shardblade.
* * *
Venli hopped down from the ship’s improvised gangway. The city before her was yet another marvel. Built up the side of a mountain, it looked almost like it had been cut from the stone—sculpted like the winds and rain had shaped the Shattered Plains.
Hundreds of singers streamed around her. Hulking Fused walked among them, bearing carapace armor as impressive as any Shardplate. Some of the ordinary singers wore warform—but unlike their Alethi counterparts, they had not been through combat training.
Azish, Thaylen, Marati … a host of nationalities, these newly awakened singers were frightened, uncertain. Venli attuned Agony. Would they force her to march to the front line? She didn’t have much battle training either; even with a form of power, she’d be cut to ribbons.
Like my people, on the field of Narak, who were sacrificed to birth the Everstorm. Odium seemed very quick to expend the lives of both listener and singer.
Timbre pulsed to Peace in her pouch, and Venli rested her hand on it. “Hush,” she whispered to Agony. “Hush. Do you want one of them to hear you?”
Timbre reluctantly softened her pulsings, though Venli could still feel a faint vibration from her pouch. And that … that relaxed her. She almost thought that she could hear the Rhythm of Peace herself.
One of the hulking Fused called for her. “You! Listener woman! Come!”
Venli attuned the Rhythm of Destruction. She would not be intimidated by these, gods though they be. She stepped up to this one and kept her head high.
The Fused handed her a sword in a sheath. She took it, then attuned Subservience. “I’ve used an axe before, but not—”
“Carry it,” he said, eyes glowing softly red. “You may need to defend yourself.”
She did not object further. There was a fine line between respectful confidence and defiance. She belted the sword on her slender body, wishing she had some carapace.
“Now,” the Fused said to Conceit, striding forward and expecting her to keep up, “tell me what this little one is saying.”
Venli followed him to a gathering of singers in workform, holding spears. She had been speaking to the Fused in the ancient language, but these were speaking in Thaylen.
I’m an interpreter, she thought, relaxing. That’s why they wanted me on the battlefield.
“What was it,” Venli said to Derision, addressing the one the Fused had indicated, “you wished to say to the holy one?”
“We…” The singer licked his lips. “We aren’t soldiers, ma’am. We’re fishers. What are we doing here?” Though a shade of the Rhythm of Anxiety laced his words, his cringing form and face were the stronger indication. He spoke and acted like a human.
She interpreted.
“You are here to do as you are told,” the Fused told them, through Venli. “In return, you are rewarded with further opportunities to serve.” Though his rhythm was Derision, he didn’t seem angry. More … as if he were lecturing a child.
She passed that along, and the sailors looked to each other, shuffling uncomfortably.
“They wish to object,” she told the Fused. “I can read it in them.”
“They may speak,” he said.
She prompted them, and their leader looked down, then spoke to Anxiety. “It’s just that … Thaylen City? This is our home. We’re expected to attack it?”
“Yes,” the Fused said after Venli interpreted. “They enslaved you. They tore your families apart, treated you like dumb animals. Do you not thirst for vengeance?”
“Vengeance?” the sailor said, looking to his fellows for support. “We’re glad to be free. But … I mean … some of them treated us pretty nice. Can’t we just go settle somewhere, and leave the Thaylens alone?”
“No,” the Fused said. Venli interpreted, then jumped to follow him as he stalked off.
“Great one?” she asked to Subservience.
“These have the wrong Passion,” he said. “The ones who attacked Kholinar did so gladly.”
“The Alethi are a warlike people, great one. It’s not surprising they passed this on to their slaves. And perhaps these were better treated?”
“They were slaves for far too long. We need to show them a better way.”
Venli stuck close to the Fused, happy to have found one that was both sane and reasonable. He didn’t shout at the groups they visited, many of whom shared similar complaints. He merely had her repeat the same sorts of phrases.
You must seize vengeance, little ones. You must earn your Passion.
Qualify yourselves for greater service, and you will be elevated to the place of a Regal, given a form of power.
This land was yours long ago, before they stole it. You have been trained to be docile. We will teach you to be strong again.
The Fused remained calm, but fierce. Like a smoldering fire. Controlled, but ready to burst alight. He eventually walked to join some of his fellows. Around them, the singer army formed up awkwardly, coating the land just east of the bay. Alethi troops mustered across a short battlefield, banners flapping. They had archers, heavy infantry, light infantry, even some outriders on horses.
Venli hummed to Agony. This was going to be a slaughter.
She suddenly felt something odd. Like a rhythm, but oppressive, demanding. It shook the very air, and the ground beneath her feet trembled. Lightning in the clouds behind seemed to flash to this rhythm, and in a moment she saw that the area around her was filled with ghostly spren.
Those are the spirits of the dead, she realized. Fused who haven’t yet chosen a body. Most were twisted to the point that she barely recognized them as singers. Two were roughly the size of buildings.
One dominated even these: a creature of swirling violence, tall as a small hill, seemingly made up entirely of red smoke. She could see these overlaid on the real world, but somehow knew they would be invisible to most. She could see into the other world. That happened sometimes right before …