Having seen how much work Renarin was putting into learning his Plate, Kaladin suspected that might take longer than Moash wanted. He didn’t say anything, instead stepping back out into the sunlight. He enjoyed that for a moment, eyes closed, head toward the sky.

Then, he jogged off to rejoin Bridge Four.

67. Spit and Bile

My path has been chosen very deliberately. Yes, I agree with everything you have said about Rayse, including the severe danger he presents.

Dalinar stopped on the switchbacks down from the Pinnacle, Navani at his side. In the waning light, they watched a river of men flowing back into the warcamps from the Shattered Plains. The armies of Bethab and Thanadal were returning from their plateau run, following their highprinces, who had probably gotten back somewhat earlier.

Down below, a rider approached the Pinnacle, likely with news for the king on the runs. Dalinar looked to one of his guards—he had four tonight, two for him, two for Navani—and gestured.

“You want the details, Brightlord?” asked the bridgeman.

“Please.”

The man jogged off down the switchbacks. Dalinar watched him go, thoughtful. These men were remarkably disciplined, considering their origin—but they were not career soldiers. They did not like what he had done in throwing their captain into prison.

He suspected they wouldn’t let it become a problem. Captain Kaladin led them well—he was the exact type of officer Dalinar looked for. The kind that showed initiative not because of a desire for advancement, but because of the satisfaction of a job well done. Those kinds of soldiers often had rocky starts until they learned to keep their heads. Storms. Dalinar himself had needed similar lessons pounded into him at various points in his life.

He continued with Navani down the switchbacks, walking slowly. She looked radiant tonight, hair done with sapphires that glowed softly in the light. Navani liked these strolls together, and they were in no hurry to arrive at the feast.

“I keep thinking,” Navani said, continuing their previous conversation, “that there should be a way to use fabrials as pumps. You have seen the gemstones built to attract certain substances, but not others—it is most useful with something like smoke above a fire. Could we make this work with water?”

Dalinar grunted, nodding.

“More and more buildings in the warcamps are plumbed,” she continued, “after the Kharbranthian manner—but those use gravity itself as a way to conduct the liquid through their piping. I imagine true motion, with gemstones at the ends of piping segments to pull water through at a flow, against the pull of the earth…”

He grunted again.

“We made a breakthrough in the design of new Shardblades the other day.”

“What, really?” he asked. “What happened? How soon will you have one ready?”

She smiled, arm around his.

“What?”

“Just seeing if you are still you,” she said. “Our breakthrough was realizing that the gemstones in the Blades—used to bond them—might not have originally been part of the weapons.”

He frowned. “That’s important?”

“Yes. If this is true, it means the Blades aren’t powered by the stones. Credit goes to Rushu, who asked why a Shardblade can be summoned and dismissed even if its gemstone has gone dun. We had no answers, and she spent the last few weeks in contact with Kharbranth, using one of those new information stations. She came up with a scrap from several decades after the Recreance which talks about men learning to summon and dismiss Blades by adding gemstones to them, an accident of ornamentation it seems.”

He frowned as they passed a shalebark outcropping where a gardener was working late, carefully filing away and humming to himself. The sun had set; Salas had just risen in the east.

“If this is true,” Navani said, sounding happy, “we’re back to knowing absolutely nothing about how Shardblades were crafted.”

“I don’t see why that’s a breakthrough at all.”

She smiled, patting him on the arm. “Imagine you had spent the last five years believing an enemy had been following Dialectur’s War as a model for tactics, but then heard it reported they instead had never heard of the treatise.”

“Ah…”

“We had been assuming that somehow, the strength and lightness of the Blades was a fabrial construct powered by the gemstone,” Navani said. “This might not be the case. It seems the gemstone’s purpose is only used in initially bonding the Blade—something that the Radiants didn’t need to do.”

“Wait. They didn’t?”

“Not if this fragment is correct. The implication is that the Radiants could always dismiss and summon Blades—but for a time the ability was lost. It was only recovered when someone added a gemstone to his Blade. The fragment says the weapons actually shifted shape to adopt the stones, but I’m not certain if I trust that.

“Either way, after the Radiants fell but before men learned to put gemstones into their Blades and bond them, the weapons were apparently still supernaturally sharp and light, though bonding was impossible. This would explain several other fragments of records I’ve read and found confusing…”

She continued, and he found her voice pleasant. The details of fabrial construction, however, were not pressing to him at the moment. He did care. He had to care. Both for her, and for the needs of the kingdom.

He just couldn’t care right now. In his head, he went over preparations for the expedition out onto the Shattered Plains. How to protect the Soulcasters from sight, as they preferred. Sanitation shouldn’t be an issue, and water would be plentiful. How many scribes would he need to bring? Horses? Only one week remained, and he had the majority of the preparations in place, such as mobile bridge construction and supply estimations. There was always more to plan, however.

Unfortunately, the biggest variable was one he couldn’t plan for, not specifically. He didn’t know how many troops he’d have. It depended on which of the highprinces, if any, agreed to go with him. Less than a week out, and he still wasn’t certain if any of them would.

I could use Hatham most, Dalinar thought. He runs a tight army. If only Aladar hadn’t sided with Sadeas so vigorously; I can’t figure that man out. Thanadal and Bethab… storms, will I bring their mercenaries if either of those two agree to come? Is that the kind of force I want? Dare I refuse any spear that comes to me?

“I’m not going to get a good conversation out of you tonight, am I?” Navani asked.

“No,” he admitted as they reached the base of the Pinnacle and turned south. “I’m sorry.”

She nodded, and he could see the mask cracking. She talked about her work because it was something to talk about. He stopped beside her. “I know it hurts,” he said softly. “But it will get better.”

“She wouldn’t let me be a mother to her, Dalinar,” Navani said, staring into the distance. “Do you know that? It was almost like… like once Jasnah climbed into adolescence, she no longer needed a mother. I would try to get close to her, and there was this coldness, like even being near me reminded her that she had once been a child. What happened to my little girl, so full of questions?”