Dawnshard Page 3

  “From the large island, yes,” Navani said. “But what of the smaller ones surrounding it? What of the hidden one, shrouded in mystery and storm?”

  “The Rock of Secrets,” Rysn said. “The mythical Akinah. Some say it is only a legend.”

  “They said the same about Urithiru,” Navani said. “Some scholars think the ruins they’ve found in other locations are remnants of the city, but their evidence is weak. Our Windrunners report a strange weather pattern surrounding a specific place in the ocean there, the very place the ghost ship was said to have been on course to visit before falling.

  “I’m convinced Akinah is hidden inside that strange weather pattern. Either way, we need to investigate. My husband worries the winds might veil an enemy fortress.”

  “Your Windrunners reported?” Rysn said. “So . . . why not have them fly down and investigate?” This was the item from the request that most confused her, the one that had made her come to Urithiru to ask in person. Why did the Knights Radiant need the help of a common sailing vessel?

  “There is . . . something on that island,” Navani said. “Something that is able to undermine the powers of the Knights Radiant. My soldiers reported seeing swarms of small shadows darting through the clouds. And legends about Aimia speak of mythical creatures that feed off Stormlight.”

  Reflexively, Rysn glanced toward the palanquin and Chiri-Chiri inside. Navani watched her, calm, her lips cocked slightly to the side. She knew. Well, of course she did. Rysn hadn’t tried to keep Chiri-Chiri hidden—and the little larkin wouldn’t have let her if she had.

  “May I see the creature?” Navani asked. “I promise I won’t try to separate it from you.”

  Well, Rysn had known this conversation would be difficult for her to steer. You couldn’t always negotiate from a position of power. So she waved for Nikli to pick Chiri-Chiri up and carry her over.

  As the months had passed, Rysn had begun to truly grasp the strategic importance of Stormlight as a fuel both for fabrials and for the Knights Radiant. Beyond that, the enemy had creatures—known as Fused—who used the Void’s own Light. Chiri-Chiri fed on that just as eagerly as Stormlight.

  Was the strange creature she kept as a pet something more dangerous, and more important, than she’d ever stopped to consider? Rysn took Chiri-Chiri, who stood up, then lifted her wings. A sleek monster in miniature—despite her wan carapace, she was as majestic as any greatshell. Indeed, Chiri-Chiri seemed more energetic than she had earlier. Perhaps she was feeling better.

  A few awespren, like rings of blue smoke, appeared around Navani as she leaned down. “It’s gorgeous,” she whispered. “And does it really . . .”

  As if in response, Chiri-Chiri clicked and took to the air, her wings beating quickly. She flew across the room to the wall where she grasped hold of the lamp fixture. Rysn put her hand to her face as—without so much as a click of embarrassment—Chiri-Chiri ingested the Stormlight in the lamp, darkening the room significantly.

  “I’m sorry, Brightness,” Rysn said. “We’ve been trying to work on not eating lights inside fixtures. She’s been feeling sick lately though, and has been regressing.”

  Navani merely watched with wide eyes. She brought out a few diamond chips and scattered them on her table. Fortunately, Chiri-Chiri saw these as easier prey, and dropped to the table with a thump to begin ingesting their Light. After consuming a few, she mouthed one of the spheres and began to play with it, rolling it away, then hopping over and catching it in her mouth before it could fall off the desk.

  “Is this it?” Navani whispered. “The way the Thaylen artifabrians can so carefully adjust the Stormlight in their fabrials? Do your people have dozens of these beasts hidden away?”

  “What?” Rysn said. “No, Brightness. I was given Chiri-Chiri on a trading expedition in the Reshi Isles. She’s the only one I’ve ever seen; an oddity, not a secret weapon.”

  “Still, I should very much like a chance to study one of these,” Navani said.

  By reflex, Rysn began to reach toward Chiri-Chiri—to scoop her up. Rysn restrained herself, but the queen noticed. She didn’t repeat her promise not to take Chiri-Chiri, and she didn’t need to. Rysn trusted her, well enough. Navani Kholin wasn’t a thief. But she was a woman who usually got what she wanted, eventually.

  Hopefully there was another way to fill that need.

  “My notes say you possess an extraordinary ship,” Navani said. “The storm around Akinah is terrible and persistent. Do you think your ship could penetrate it?”

  “If any ship can,” Rysn said, “it will be the Wandersail. We have fabrial pumps and modern storm stabilizers. But your information worries me. A place Radiants are afraid to visit? I must care for the well-being of my crew.”

  “I understand,” Navani said, “but I can’t risk sending Windrunners alone if they will be drained midflight and fall into the ocean to drown. And so, I need a ship. I think you’ll find that your own queen encourages this mission as well.

  “Hopefully we can minimize the danger. All I want is for you to take one of my scribes to the place, penetrate the storm, and let her survey the location. It shouldn’t take her more than a day to complete her inspection and collect a few artifacts. After that, you can return. I’ll see you properly outfitted beforehand and compensated afterward.”

  Navani handed her a paper with generous payment terms. Rysn didn’t miss the promise of traditional salvage payments to the crew, if anything valuable was located. Even without that, she was thrilled at the numbers. If she’d been forced to visit Akinah on her own, she’d have needed to arrange for many nearby merchant stops—trading goods along the way to earn maintenance for the ship and crew. But with a patron, they could take a direct course.

  She longed to do something adventurous like this. During her years training with her babsk, she’d complained incessantly about the way he’d dragged her all across Roshar. She had expected her apprenticeship to bring her to rich customers, trading for silks in courts and palaces. Instead she’d visited one backwater after another, going all the difficult places no one else thought worth the effort.

  It was a constant source of amazement that her babsk hadn’t tossed her overboard after a single day—let alone hundreds—listening to her complain. Now that she was older, she found herself sincerely missing those excursions. To go somewhere new? To investigate the trading opportunities on a mythical island? And to possibly save Chiri-Chiri in the process? The prospect thrilled her.

  There were still problems, however.

  “Brightness,” Rysn said, “I have a good crew, seasoned and well-traveled. But you need to understand, sailors can be superstitious. The fact that we’d be sailing to a forbidden island so soon after the discovery of a ghost ship returning from that location . . . well, I have spent an entire day pondering how to sell them on the idea. It’s daunting.”

  “I could send you a Radiant or two to improve morale,” Navani said.

  “That would help,” Rysn said. “Could you also ask something of Queen Fen? You said she would want this mission to take place. A personal request from our own queen to my sailors would mean a lot to them. It would transform this voyage from a simple job into a royal mandate.”

  Plus, it would help with Rysn’s authority on the ship. She shouldn’t need that, but after the curious way she’d been treated on her first voyage . . . well, she would appreciate the queen’s mandate to help prop her up.

  “It will be done,” Navani said. “Queen Fen and I have been talking for some time about an expedition like this, so I’m certain she would be willing to write to your sailors.” Navani’s eyes narrowed. “But what of you, Captain? This is a difficult mission I propose. Is my payment offer enough? Is there anything more I could offer the woman who owns her own ship and keeps a mythical creature as a pet?”

  Rysn glanced at Chiri-Chiri, who had grown tired of playing already, and was quietly batting at the sphere instead of chewing on it. She noticed Rysn, then launched int
o the air—flying to the palanquin to rest.

  Needs. And connections.

  “I should be honest, Brightness,” Rysn said. “Chiri-Chiri . . . is not well. I believe this mission could help her, so I am eager to undertake it for that reason. I need no special payment. However, if you’re willing to listen, there is something I would ask of you.”

  “Speak freely,” Navani said.

  The way Chiri-Chiri flew . . . What would it be like to be so free? Unchained? “Is it true,” Rysn asked, “that you have developed platforms that can soar high in the air?”

  “Yes,” Navani said. “We use them for archer stations on battlefields.”

  “But you’re trying to do more than that, aren’t you? Like with the construction outside, the supposed lifts?”

  “I have shared my plans with Queen Fen,” Navani said. “I’m not certain what more you want me to . . .” She trailed off, perhaps noticing that Rysn had turned from Chiri-Chiri to instead stare at something else: her wheeled chair.

  It provided her with some measure of liberty, but still required someone to push it for her. She looked forward to getting the one with large wheels she could move on her own. But that design, despite being wonderful, was so bulky. Plus, few current roads and floors were built for someone to be wheeled across. Even moving under her own power, her ability to get around would be severely limited.

  Was there instead a way to soar? Perhaps never as well as Chiri-Chiri, but almost anything would be an upgrade from the chair. Her source of freedom, but also a constant reminder that the world did not accommodate people like her.

  “I have scholars working on some prototypes that might interest you,” Navani said. “Since I’m sending a scribe on this mission anyway, I could arrange for her to be one who is experienced with our new fabrial designs. She could run some experiments for me on the ship, and perhaps show you what is possible with this technology.”

  “I would find that agreeable, Brightness,” Rysn said. “And these other terms are generous and accepted. Consider our deal sealed. The Wandersail is at your disposal.”

  3

  The Lopen had never known there were so many different types of people in the world.

  Oh, he’d expected there to be a lot, sure. But not so many. At Urithiru, you could see them all. How they dressed, how they talked, how they ate. Today, he zoomed past men from Steen with their beards wrapped in cords to make them long like a sausage. Women from Tashikk, wearing colorful wraps. Traders from New Natanan, with blue to their skin, as if they had sapphires in their veins.

  All so different. He figured, sure, that people must be like mountains. See, when you were far away from mountains, they all basically looked the same. Fly up high, soar over them in a hurry, and there was no time for detail. Pointed. Covered in snow. Mountain. Got it.

  Fly up close, and they each had their own distinctive jagged bits and places where the rock showed through. He’d even found flowers growing on a few, near vents that let out warm air. The problem with people was that everyone saw other nations from far away. Saw them as big mountainous blobs. Foreigners. Strange. Got it.

  Up close, it was hard to see people that way. Each was so distinctive. Everyone should use a “the” in front of their name. He’d merely figured that out first.

  Rua, his spren, darted out of a side corridor ahead, then spun around in a loop, excited. Looked like he’d found the Reshi people Lopen was supposed to meet with today. Great! Lopen increased his speed with a Lashing, soaring a couple feet over the heads of the people in the corridor. Some of them cringed with startled expressions. He was doing them a favor, sure, because they should be used to Windrunners flying overhead. What did they expect him to do? Walk?

  Rua transformed into one of his favorite shapes—a flying chull with broad wings—and zoomed alongside Lopen. At the next intersection, Rua led him left. They emerged into the atrium: a big open section that seemed to have no roof, just tens upon tens of levels with balconies and a large window.

  Here, Lopen finally found his Reshi visitors. Storms! How’d they gotten so far inside in such a short time? “Nice work, naco,” he said to Rua, then Lashed himself downward so he landed near the visitors.

  He strode toward them, hands out. “Greetings! And I am the Lopen, Windrunner, poet, and your most humble servant. You must be King Ral-na!”

  He’d been warned the king would be the one in the robes. He was a short man with greying hair, though his robes parted down the front to show firm pectoral muscles. He was attended by a group of fierce men in wraps, carrying spears.

  “I speak for the king,” one of them said in pretty good Alethi. The tall figure wore his hair in two long braids. “You may call me Talik.”

  “Sure, Talik!” Lopen said. “Do you like to fly?”

  “I wouldn’t be able to say,” Talik replied. “Were you the one who was supposed to—”

  “We can talk,” Lopen said, “later.” He grabbed Talik by the arm, infused him, waved to the others, then launched the two of them high into the air.

  They shot up along the window, passing story after story. Lopen hung on tight. This Talik fellow was an important official, and it wouldn’t do to drop him or something. He was surrounded by shockspren in the shape of pale yellow triangles. So he seemed to be enjoying the ride.

  “Now see, I figure that you live on a giant crab out in the ocean, right?” Lopen said as they flew. “One of the really big ones. A bigger-than-a-town type crab.

  “I had a cousin once, sure, who had a crab he swore had bred with chulls, but I didn’t think that was possible, even if it came up to my knees. So it was a big storming crab. But we couldn’t build a house on its back. That’s wild, velo. You deserve respect for living on a giant crab. Who lives on a crab? No regular people. Just people like you.”

  Lopen slowed them near the top, where the atrium finally ended, maybe a thousand feet in the air or more. It provided the best view out the window: an amazing field of snow-tipped mountains. Lopen could appreciate, from up here, how they all looked the same. One shouldn’t forget that they weren’t, sure, but there was a perspective from a distance—different from the up-close perspective.

  Up close, differences could chafe. But if you remembered that from far away you all looked the same . . . well, that was important too.

  “What is this?” Talik demanded. “Are you trying to intimidate me?”

  “Intimidate?” Lopen said, then glanced to Rua, who grew six arms and used all of them to smack his forehead at the stupidity of that idea. “Velo,” Lopen said to Talik, “you live up high on a giant crab. I figured you’d like heights.”

  “They don’t frighten me,” Talik said, folding his arms.

  “Yeah, good. See, look. The view is great, right? Something you’ve never seen, right? I know about the Reshi Sea—my cousin, he lived out on the coast, and I’ve heard him say how hot it is there. No snow.”

  Talik regarded him as they both hung in the air. Then the man turned and peered out the window, inspecting the beautiful field of mountains. “That . . . is rather spectacular.”

  “See?” Lopen said. “I told Kaladin, ‘I’m gonna fly those Reshi guys up high.’ And Kaladin said, ‘I don’t think that’s a good—’ but I didn’t let him finish, because he was going to grumble, so I said, ‘No, I got this, gancho. They’re gonna love it.’ And you love it.”

  “I . . . don’t know what to make of you,” Talik admitted.

  “Nah, velo, you do. I’m the Lopen.” He pointed at himself. Rua appeared to Talik and gestured with the six arms, then grew two more for effect. “So what do you think? Should I fly your king up here? I was a king for, sure, only a couple of hours. So I don’t really know what kings like.”

  “You . . . were a king?”

  “For two hours,” Lopen said. “It’s a long story. But my arm was newly regrown then, so for a while that arm had only been a king. Never not a king. Wild, eh?”

  Talik looked down, then waggled hi
s feet. “How long . . .”

  “Oh, you’re safe,” Lopen said. “If you drop, it would take way long for you to hit. I’d catch you first.”

  “That’s not terribly encouraging . . .” Talik said. He took a deep breath, then studied Lopen. “Normally, I would assume a person who brought me up here like this had done so to discomfort me during our negotiations. But you . . . really aren’t doing that, are you?”

  “We can go down if you want,” Lopen said. “I just thought . . . I mean, you like it, right?”

  “I do,” Talik said, then smiled. “I will admit to finding myself . . . encouraged by the presence of a Herdazian among the Knights Radiant. I lived among your people for several years, Windrunner. Let me ask you this. In your opinion, do they truly care about us? The Alethi, the Vedens, the Azish? For centuries, they’ve ignored us in the Isles. Now, amid a war, they write to us? They ask for a meeting with our king?

  “We are a proud people, the Lopen—but small, insignificant. Paid attention to by outsiders for our novelty, or for the ways we can be exploited. I trained in Thaylenah. I know how we’re regarded. And I know they have historically treated you the same way. So can you tell me why the greatest kings in Roshar would suddenly show interest in us?”

  “Oh, that,” Lopen said. “Yeah, they think maybe the enemy will start moving troops through the sea to land for an invasion of Jah Keved in the east. So, Dalinar and Jasnah figure it would be good to have you on their side.”

  “So it’s purely political,” Talik said.

  “Purely?” Lopen shrugged, and Rua did too. “They’re trying to be good, velo. But they’re, you know, Alethi. Conquering folks is basically their primary cultural heritage. It’s taking some time for them to learn to see things another way—but they are listening. They agreed to let me talk to you, after I explained we were practically cousins, what with the Reshi Isles being so close to Herdaz.”