Words of Radiance

Shallan takes a palanquin to Dalinar’s warcamp, where she discovers that he is in a meeting with the highprinces and Elhokar. She puts on a confident façade and has her soldiers announce that she is Adolin’s betrothed. Guards allow her to walk into the meeting, where Kaladin recognizes her. She admits to him that she lied when they first met, and he refuses to let her see Dalinar. She gives him a communication between Jasnah and Navani as proof, and after showing it to Dalinar, he escorts her to him.

During a break in the meeting, Adolin approaches Relis, the son of Highprince Ruthar, one of Sadeas’s strongest allies. Adolin wagers all his family’s Shardblades and Shardplates, but Relis refuses. However, Eilt, Relis’s ambitious cousin, agrees to the terms. Adolin turns from them to meet Sadeas, who tells Adolin that he only betrayed Dalinar as a kindness, to give the old man a warrior’s death. Amaram breaks them up and tells Adolin that he hopes to have Dalinar and Sadeas work together. Adolin is distracted, however, when he notices a pretty, young woman crossing the room and wonders if she is his betrothed.

Shallan shares news of Jasnah’s death with Dalinar and Navani. Navani is hurt by the news and leaves. Adolin introduces himself, and Shallan finds him cute, though Dalinar dismisses him to speak with Shallan alone. He asks Shallan why the betrothal should continue with Jasnah gone, and she argues that Jasnah’s selection of her as a ward is reason enough. The meeting continues, and Shallan watches the Highprinces bicker. When someone notices her and asks about the war breaking out in Jah Keved, she claims she knows little. When Dalinar claims that she will stay with him, she interrupts him to say that she has already accepted an offer from Highprince Sebarial. Sebarial has made no such offer. He is seen as the lazy fool of the 10 highprinces, but though he is caught off guard, he goes along with Shallan. Before the meeting ends, Dalinar announces that he will sue for peace with the Parshendi. If they do not accept his terms, he will attack them in hopes of wiping them out.

Four years ago, Shallan attended a feast to celebrate her father’s betrothal to a much younger woman. When a messenger from their highprince arrived to investigate claims that Shallan’s father had killed his first wife, he dismissed the guests. Shallan remembered flashes of the day her mother died and quietly suggested to her brothers that their father did not kill her.

Shallan rides with Sebarial back to his warcamp, and Sebarial explains that he acts the fool to distract the other Highprinces from his true goal. He hopes the warcamps will become cities, and in preparation for this goal, he develops manufacturing and an economy in his camp. He welcomes her into his home and houses her soldiers. His mistress shows Shallan to her room. Finally safe, Shallan sleeps.

Kaladin goes to the chasm to train, trying to replicate what Szeth did by running along walls. It takes him a few tries, but after some practice, Kaladin is able to use Stormlight to run up the wall of the chasm. While he works, Syl asks Kaladin what he wants. When he says that he wants both revenge on Amaram and to trust Dalinar, she warns him that while he can certainly trust Dalinar, his hatred for Amaram may consume him. When he returns to his barracks, Kaladin finds Renarin—a lighteyes—waiting. Renarin asks if he can join the Bridge Four crew to gain experience. Kaladin agrees, and when Moash complains about letting a lighteyes join him, Kaladin once again suspects his friend of being involved with the assassination attempt.

Shallan waits for a message on her spanreeder from the Ghostbloods. While the contact writes out a message, Shallan draws herself as a dark-eyed woman. She then uses Stormlight to Lightweave this image onto herself. When she receives a message saying that the Ghostbloods want to meet that night, Shallan sends a message back in Tyn’s handwriting, saying she will send her apprentice. Shallan keeps her disguise on and climbs out the window.

Shallan arrives at the meeting place, where she meets a man named Mraize, who is upset that Tyn did not come in person. Despite her nerves, Shallan keeps her disguise in place and argues that she is useful. Mraize asks Shallan to give Tyn her next assignment: Tyn is to investigate Brightlord Amaram and find his secrets. When Shallan leaves, a woman in a mask follows her, and she only escapes by using Stormlight to create a brick wall over a doorway and hide. She decides to investigate Amaram herself and report back, believing the Ghostbloods have information that will help her in her research.

Kaladin and Moash go to the training yard to learn to defend against a Shardblade, but when Shallan arrives, Kaladin watches her, wondering if she could be an assassin. She is there to begin a project of recording the kingdom’s Shardblades and Shardplates through sketches, and she asks Adolin for help.

As they converse after training, Moash reveals that Elhokar killed his grandparents. Elhokar’s friend, a silversmith, wanted to ruin Moash’s grandparents’ business to eliminate competition, and he convinced Elhokar to throw the elderly couple in prison. They died before their case was argued. Moash admits to participating in the recent assassination attempt against Elhokar: He let down a rope to give the assassins access to the balcony. Kaladin convinces Moash not to do anything else, promising he will not turn him in and that he will meet with Moash’s group to hear them out. Before they leave, Kaladin asks Zahel how Dalinar caught Szeth’s blade. Zahel calls the maneuver a lastclap but refuses to teach it to Kaladin.

Three and a half years ago, Shallan attends Middlefest with her family, watching duels with her father. As they spectate, a competing Brightlord joins them and forces Shallan’s father into a bad business deal by threatening to ruin his reputation. Shallan sneaks away to set up her brother Balat on a walk with a girl he likes. When she returns, a messenger from Helaran is meeting with her father, though her father soon angrily dismisses him. She runs away from her father’s anger and visits her other brother, Wikim. Wikim is reclusive and lonely, and she encourages him to find happiness. After leaving Wikim, she meets the messenger whom her father angrily dismissed. He asks her if she ever sees spren or hears voices. She says no, but then he asks Shallan what beauty means to her, and a scene of her family, happy, in a garden arises around her. The spheres in his hand are drained, and he tells her that she is not ready to be taught.

Kaladin finds Shen and gives him a spear, apologizing for his prejudice and welcoming him as a full member of Bridge Four. Moash interrupts them to invite Kaladin out drinking. Kaladin joins, and at the pub, Moash brings him to a private room where he meets Graves and his team, all behind the assassination attempt. Graves believes that Elhokar’s leadership is causing grave harm, and he wants to remove him and install Dalinar for the good of the kingdom. Kaladin assures them he will think about it, but afterward, he tells Moash to stay away.

Shallan looks at Jasnah’s maps, trying to discern where Urithiru was on the Shattered Plains. After meditating more on the legends that said the city was well-connected to the outside world, she realizes that Jasnah did not believe the city was here, but that a means to access it was. She believes there is an Oathgate, a portal, on the Shattered Plains that will transport them to Urithiru. As she practices her Lightweaving, Shallan discovers that she can only produce images she physically draws.

Three years ago, Shallan sat with her brothers Balat and Wikim in their garden. They heard a carriage arrive, and as they rushed in, Wikim gave Shallan a bag of poisonous leaves, saying that he no longer needed to carry them with him. He was happier than he had been a year ago because of Shallan’s kindness. In the hall, Jushu was bound, and his debtors demanded their father pay for him. Their father refused, and the men took Jushu away. Shallan asked Balat and Wikim for their ornamental knives, and she used these and her necklace to barter for Jushu’s freedom. Afterward, she stayed in her room, and her father came to visit her, saying he would never hurt her but that he must get his anger out.

Shallan meets Adolin on a patio for wine before a highstorm arrives. They exchange pleasantries, and as Adolin speaks of his bravery on the battlefield, Shallan catches him off guard by asking him about what it is really like wearing Shardplate. He is embarrassed to be so personal but enjoys having a real conversation. Shallan finds him charming, and the two trust each other. Adolin tells her of his plans to undermine Sadeas with his duels, and she asks him to take her out to the Shattered Plains for her research. He promises to convince Navani to work with her, but when she mentions that Jasnah believed the Alethi needed to abandon the parshmen, he claims that this would be impossible. When the highstorm arrives, Shallan is fascinated, and before they part, Adolin promises to meet her again in a week.

As Adolin waits out the highstorm, Sadeas approaches him and tries to convince him that his antagonism is for the good of Alethkar, as both Dalinar and Elhokar are the wrong men to lead. Sadeas tells Adolin that he believes Adolin will make a great Highprince in a decade once the inevitable civil wars die down.

When Adolin arrives home, he finds Dalinar and Navani studying another carving on the wall: “Thirty-two days […] Seek the center” (587). They are sure that Dalinar carved it while in a visionary trance, and they believe that “the center” refers to the center of the Shattered Plains, where the Parshendi live. Dalinar hopes the peace talks will help them get there. In 32 days, it will be the middle of the Weeping, the brief time of year when highstorms cease, replaced by a constant drizzle.

Before peace talks with the Parshendi, Adolin demands that he go in his father’s place, believing Dalinar is too important to risk his life. Dalinar agrees, and Adolin meets Eshonai on the Shattered Plains in his father’s Shardplate. Eshonai seems different, confident and antagonistic, with no intention of making peace. When Adolin asks about this shift in demeanor, she tells him that the Parshendi change. She then warns him that the Alethi will be destroyed. Back at the warcamp, Adolin apologizes, but Dalinar is happy with the outcome, confident now in the decision to attack the Parshendi. With peace impossible, Dalinar will lead his army right after the final highstorm before the Weeping.