In truth, it would be a combination of a Vessel’s craftiness and the power’s Intent that we should fear most.

Navani and her timid attendants soon left the broad hallway scattered with corpses and entered a series of corridors with darkened lanterns on the walls. The broken latches bespoke thieves with crowbars getting at the spheres inside. For some people, no nightmare was terrible enough—no war bloody enough—to discourage some creative personal enrichment.

The sounds of screams and echoes of thunder faded. Navani felt as if she were entering the mythical centerbeat—the heart of a highstorm spoken of by some poor wanderers trapped within its winds. A moment when for reasons inexplicable, the wind stopped and all became still.

She eventually reached the place where the Sibling had told her to go—a specific intersection among these twisting corridors. Though no part of the first level went completely unused, this area was among the least trafficked. The corridors here made a maze of frustrating design, and they used the small rooms for various storage dumps.

“Now what?” asked Elthebar, the stormwarden. Navani wasn’t particularly happy to have the tall man along; he looked silly with his pointed beard and his mysterious robes. But he’d been in the map room with them, and forbidding him hadn’t seemed right when she needed every mind she could get.

“Search this area,” Navani said to the others. “See if you can find a vein of garnet on the walls. It might be small and hidden among the changing colors of the strata.”

They did as she requested. Dabbid, the mute bridgeman, started searching the floor instead of the walls—working with his sphere enclosed entirely in his hand so it gave almost no light.

“Cover up your spheres and lanterns,” Navani said to the others. The command drew expressions that ranged between confused and horrified, but Navani led the way, closing the shield on her lantern.

The others obeyed one at a time, plunging the room into darkness. Light from a distant corridor flashed red in a sequence—only with no thunder. A few people’s hands glowed softly from the spheres inside, backlighting veins and bones.

“There,” Navani said, picking out a faint twinkling on the floor near one of the walls. They clustered around it, investigating the spark of garnet light in a hidden vein of crystal.

“What is it?” Isabi asked. “What kind of spren?”

The light started moving through the vein, across the floor, then down the corridor. Navani ignored the questions, following the spark until it moved up a wall. Here it followed the curving strata into a specific room, rounding the stone and slipping through the gap between door and doorway.

Venan had keys, fortunately. Inside, they had to step over rolled rugs to find the spark of light at the rear. Navani brushed her fingers against it and found a small bulge in the wall.

A gemstone, she realized. Connected to the line of crystal. It’s embedded in here so deeply, it’s difficult to see. Seemed to be a topaz. Hadn’t there been a similar gemstone embedded into the wall of that room where they’d found the model of the tower?

Infuse the topaz, the Sibling’s voice said in her mind. You can do this without Radiants? I have seen you perform such marvels.

“I need several small topazes,” Navani said to her scholars. “No larger than three kivs each.”

Her team scrambled; they kept gemstones of all sizes on hand for their experiments, and one soon brought forth a small case of infused topazes. Navani instructed her and several others to take the gemstones in tweezers and present them to the topaz set into the wall.

An infused gemstone touched to an uninfused one could be made to lend some of its Stormlight—assuming they were the same variety, and the uninfused gemstone was much larger than the infused ones. It worked a little like a pressure differential. A large empty vessel would take Stormlight from small full vessels.

It was a slow process, especially when the gemstone you wanted to infuse was relatively small—limiting the potential size differential. She moved up next to Ulvlk and Vrandl, the two Thaylen scholars. Both were artifabrians of a very secretive guild.

“Almighty send we can make this work in time,” Navani said as thunder echoed behind them.

“So that is why you brought us,” Vrandl said. She was a short woman who preferred havahs to traditional Thaylen dress. She wore her eyebrows in tight curls. “The tower is invaded, your men are dying, and you see an opportunity to pry trade secrets from our fingers?”

“The world is ending,” Navani countered, “and our greatest advantage—this tower, with its ability to instantly move troops from one end of Roshar to the other—is threatened. Is this really the time to hoard trade secrets, Brightness?”

The two women didn’t reply.

“You’d watch it burn?” Navani said, feeling exhausted—and snappish. “You’d actually let Urithiru fall rather than share what you know? If we lose the Oathgates permanently, that’s it for the war. That’s it for your homeland.”

Again they remained silent.

“Fine,” Navani said. “I hope when you die—knowing your homeland is doomed, your families enslaved, your queen executed—you feel satisfied knowing that at least you maintained a slight market advantage.”

Navani pushed to the front of the group, where her scholars were coaxing Stormlight into the wall gem bit by bit. Often a fabrial needed to fill a certain percentage before it activated—but the more this one drew in Stormlight, the slower the drain would occur.

Footsteps scraped the stone behind her, and Navani turned to see Ulvlk—junior of the two Thaylen scholars—standing behind her. “We use sound,” she whispered. “If you can make the gemstone vibrate at a certain frequency, it will draw in Stormlight regardless of the size of gems placed next to it.”

“Frequency…” Navani said. “How did you discover this?”

“Traditions,” she whispered. “Passed down for centuries.”

“Create a vibration…” Navani said. “You use drilled holes? No … that would require Stormlight to be already infused. Tuning forks?”

“Yes,” Ulvlk explained. “We touch the tuning fork against the full gemstone, making it vibrate, then can lead a line of Stormlight out to the empty one. After that, it will siphon, like liquid.”

“Do you have the equipment here, now?” Navani asked.

“I…”

“Of course you do,” Navani said. “When I sent runners to fetch you, you thought I was going to evacuate you. You’d have grabbed anything of value in your rooms.”

The young Thaylen woman fished in her pocket, pulling out a metal tuning fork.

“You will be expelled from the guild!” Vrandl snapped from behind, angerspren pooling beneath her. “This is a ploy!”

“It’s no ploy,” Navani assured the nervous young woman. “Honestly, we were close to a breakthrough using the weapons the Fused have—which are able to drain Stormlight out of a person. All you’ve done here is potentially save this tower from invaders.”

Navani tried the method, hitting the tuning fork, then touching one of the infused gemstones. Indeed, as she pulled it away from the stone and toward the gemstone on the wall, it trailed a small stream of Stormlight. Like how Light behaved when a Radiant was sucking it in.

That did the trick, infusing the wall gemstone in seconds. The Sibling had explained what was coming, but Navani still jumped when—upon being infused—the fabrial made the entire wall shake.

It parted at the center; it had been a hidden door all along—locked by a fabrial that in the old days probably only a Radiant could have activated. They quickly uncovered their lanterns and spheres, revealing a small circular chamber with a pedestal in the center. Set into that was a large sapphire, uninfused.

“Quickly,” Navani said to the others, “let’s get to work.”

*   *   *

Kaladin slung his pack over his shoulder, then slipped out of the room of another frightened family. This one, like those before, had asked him for news, for information, for promises. Was it going to be all right? Would the other Radiants rise as he had? When would the Bondsmith return?

He wished he had answers. He felt so blind. He’d grown accustomed to being in the thick of everything important—privy to not only the plans of important people, but their worries and their fears as well.

He followed Syl, who darted into the hallway. The hour was late, and Kaladin had to fight off a bout of grogginess, despite the shakes and thumps in the stone. Distant explosions from far below, so powerful they had to be the acts of Regals or Fused. Somewhere in the tower, men fought. But up here on the sixth floor, they cowered. The place dripped with the silence of a thousand frightened people.

He reached an intersection, fighting off his fatigue. He was supposed to get back to the clinic and meet up with his father, but Syl was flitting around another way—she clearly wanted his attention. They had decided to keep her distant from him in case a Voidspren noticed her.

He followed her down the left fork, through a doorway that led out onto the large, patio-like balcony near his quarters. Though many of these balconies were being used as community spots, this one was empty tonight—save for one figure standing near the edge. The carapace jutting out through holes in the uniform made Rlain distinctive, even in silhouette.

“Hey,” Kaladin said, stepping up to him. Syl settled on the banister, glowing softly. Kaladin found it eerie to stare out in the darkness of night, overlooking an endless landscape of mountains and clouds—shimmering green from the final moon.

“More troops,” Rlain said, nodding toward the plateau below—where another formation of singers was moving toward the tower’s front gates. “They march like human armies, not like listener warpairs.”

“I thought you were going to stay hidden in the clinic.”

“This will be an occupation, Kal,” Rlain said, voice tinged by a mournful rhythm. “We won’t be recovering Urithiru tonight—or anytime soon. So where does that leave me?”

“You’re not one of them.”

“Am I one of you?”

“You’ll always be a member of Bridge Four.”

“That’s not what I meant.” Rlain turned toward him, green moonlight shining against his carapace and skin. “If I try to hide among the humans, I will be courting disaster. Assuming I could somehow stay out of sight, someone is going to reveal me to the Fused. Someone will think I’m a spy for the enemy, and after that … well, it’s going to be very difficult to explain why I didn’t walk out and embrace their occupation.”

Kaladin wanted to object. But storms, he was worried about a similar thing happening to him. One mention that he’d been a Radiant—that the surgeon’s son was Kaladin Stormblessed, Windrunner—and … well, who knew what would happen?

“So what do you do?” Syl asked from the railing.

“Go to them,” Rlain said. “Pretend I’m not a listener, just an ordinary parshman who never managed to escape—and didn’t know what I should do. It might work. Either that, or maybe I can hide among them, pretend I’ve always been with them. Merely another face in their forces.”

“And if they take you out into the Everstorm?” Kaladin asked. “Demand you take a Regal form—or worse, give yourself up to the soul of a Fused?”

“Then I’ll have to find a way to escape, won’t I?” Rlain said. “This has been coming, Kal. I think I’ve always known I would have to face them. I could make a home here if I wanted. I know that, and I’ll always be grateful to you and the others for making a place for me.

“At the same time, I can’t ignore what was done to my people at the hands of human empires. I won’t be fully comfortable here. Not while I wonder if there are other listeners out there who survived the Everstorm. Not while I wonder if there’s more I could be doing to stop the disaster.”

Kaladin took a deep breath, though part of him was tearing inside. “Another farewell then.”

“A temporary one, I hope,” Rlain said. Then, looking somewhat awkward, he held out his hands and gave Kaladin an embrace. Rlain had never seemed fond of that human custom, but Kaladin was glad for the gesture.

“Thank you,” Rlain said, pulling back. “For trusting me to make this decision.”

“That’s what you said you wanted, all those months ago,” Kaladin said. “When I promised I’d listen.”

“To be trusted and acknowledged,” Rlain said.

“I keep my oaths, Rlain. Especially to friends.”

“I’m not going to join them, Kal. I am a spy. That is my training—as best my kind could offer. I’ll find a way to help from the inside. Remember that the first people Odium destroyed when he returned were not human, but listener.”

“Bridge Four,” Kaladin said.

“Life before death,” Rlain returned. Then he slipped away toward the interior of the tower.

Syl remained seated on the banister. Kaladin leaned against the stone, waiting for a cheerful line from Syl. When others tried to console him with laughs, it often struck him as false, unnecessary. But from her … well, she helped pull him out of the deep waters.

“They’re all going to leave, aren’t they?” she whispered instead. “Moash, Rock, now Rlain … every one of them. They’re going to leave. Or … or worse…” She looked at Kaladin, uncharacteristically solemn. “They’ll all go away, and then there will be nothingness.”

“Syl,” Kaladin said. “You shouldn’t say things like that.”

“It’s true though,” she said. “Isn’t it?”

“I won’t leave you.”

“Like you almost did?” she said softly. “My old knight … he didn’t want to leave.… It’s not his fault. He was mortal though. Everyone dies. Except me.”

“Syl?” Kaladin said. “What’s wrong? Is whatever they did to the tower affecting you?”

She was silent for a time, staring out over the green clouds. “Yes, of course,” she said. “I’m sorry. That’s not what you needed, is it? I can be perky. I can be happy. See?” She launched into the air, becoming a line of light that zipped around his head.

“I didn’t mean—” Kaladin said.

“Don’t be such a worrier,” she cut in. “Can’t you take a joke these days, Kaladin? Come on. We need to get back to the clinic.”

She zipped off, and—confused, worried, but most of all just exhausted—he followed.

*   *   *

Navani watched as her people worked, infusing the gemstone at the center of the small chamber. They had borrowed a second tuning fork from the Thaylen scholars, doubling their speed.

Such a simple tool. She and Rushu had theorized for hours about the process the Thaylen artifabrians were using—guessing everything from hidden Radiants to intricate machinery that mimicked water osmosis methods, which followed similar scientific principles to Light infusion. In the end, their actual method was far, far humbler.

Wasn’t that often how it turned out? Science seemed easy in retrospect. Why hadn’t the ancients figured out you could intentionally trap a spren in a gemstone? Why hadn’t they discovered that a split gemstone would be paired? Add a little aluminum for the cage, and you could do incredible things. With this knowledge, people four thousand years ago could have had flying ships as easily as Navani’s people.

True, the hundreds of tiny leaps that led to advances were not as intuitive as they seemed. Regardless, it left Navani wondering. What wonders could she create if she knew the next few leaps that would appear simple to her descendants? What marvelous creations did she brush past each day, lying in pieces, waiting to be combined?

More thunder sounded; she hoped that the continued noise was a good sign for Teofil and his men. Move faster, she willed the Stormlight. Unfortunately, something was odd about this gemstone. Though the new Thaylen method did indeed transfer Stormlight quickly, the strange fabrial seemed to be drinking far too much in. They’d emptied most of the spheres they’d brought, and still the sapphire barely glowed. They seemed to be injecting Light not just into the gemstone, but into the entire network of gemstones and crystal veins.

Was it actually a fabrial? Navani didn’t recognize the cage, though it did have metal wire running around it. And why did it have a glass globe, the size of her fist, set off to the side in its own nook and attached to the gemstone by wires?

As her scholars worked, emptying one gemstone after the other, Navani brushed the back of her freehand fingers against a vein of garnet in the wall.

You must move quickly, the Sibling said in her mind.

“We are going as fast as we can,” Navani whispered. “Are my soldiers still alive?”

I cannot see them, the Sibling said. My vision is limited, in ways that are confusing to me, as it was not always so. But I think the soldiers you sent are close. I can hear shouts nearby the crystal heart of the tower.

Navani closed her eyes, hoping the Almighty would accept a whispered prayer, as she had no glyphward to burn.

Hurry, the Sibling said. Hurry.

She glanced toward the pile of gemstones. Fortunately, the Thaylen method could move Stormlight between different types of polestone. “We are trying. Do you know why spren prefer different kinds of gemstones?”

Because they are different, the Sibling said. Why do humans prefer one kind of food to another?

“Yet foods dyed different colors—but with the same taste—are often equally acceptable to us.” Navani nodded to a small pile of emeralds. “Many gemstones are identical, at least by their structure. We think they might even have the same basic chemical composition.”

Color is like flavor to spren, the Sibling said. It is part of the soul of a thing.

Curious.

You must move quickly, the Sibling repeated. The Lady of Pains has the Surge of Transformation and dangerous knowledge. She will infuse my entire heart—the pillar—in the proper order, using her Voidlight. In so doing, she would corrupt me and leave me … leave me as one of the Unmade.…

“And what we do here will defend you?” Navani whispered.

Yes. It will erect a barrier, preventing anyone—human, Unmade, or singer—from reaching me.

“That would stop Teofil too,” Navani said. “From breaking the construction that is blocking our Radiants.”

Teofil is doomed, the Sibling said. You must hurry. Navani, they have activated the Oathgate again. Fresh enemy troops have arrived.

“How are they working it? They have Skybreakers, but they should be as limited as our Radiants, right?”

They brought a human with one of the Honorblades.

Moash. The murderer. Navani felt her anger rising. There was, unfortunately, little more she could do.

Quickly. Please. Quickly … The Sibling seemed to hesitate. Wait. Something has happened. The Lady of Pains has stopped.

*   *   *

Venli witnessed the last push of the human soldiers. She stood at the base of the steps—which were of an odd sort. The stairwell up to the ground floor was a large column of open space. Steps wound around the outside wall of the cylinder. They looked so narrow and uncertain, hanging as they did with a cavity of open space up the center.

It was pure madness to attempt to fight down such steep and uncertain footing while harried by Fused and Regals. Yet the humans made a valiant run of it. They locked shields and moved together with a precision that Venli’s sister had always admired. While listeners would fight as warpairs, in tune with one another and the rhythms of Roshar, humans seemed to have their own kind of symbiosis—forged from hours upon hours spent training.

A canopy of shields protected against Heavenly Ones, who hovered about the formation, trying to stab with their lances—but indoors, they didn’t have proper room to maneuver. Before beginning their assault, the humans had poured barrels of water into the breach here—and it had rained upon the stormform Regals below. Their powers reacted poorly around water, something Venli had always found somewhat ironic.

The descent was so dramatic that Venli sent for Raboniel, interrupting the Fused’s work with the pillar. Raboniel marched out and looked up with shock at how close the humans were.

“Quickly,” she snapped at the nearby stormforms. “Up those steps! Engage the soldiers directly!”

They obeyed, but with their powers dampened by the water, they were no match for the troops. The humans stabbed them dead or forced them off the sides of the steps, pushing ever downward, rounding the circular wall, grimly stepping over the bodies of their fallen comrades and maintaining a front line that was three men wide.

“Amazing,” Raboniel whispered. The humans fought like a great-shelled beast—a winding, relentless chasmfiend, all armor and teeth.

Raboniel waved for the rest of the Deepest Ones to join the fight—but even these proved ineffective. They had disrupted the formation a few times early on, shoving their hands out of walls to push men, or reaching out from the side to grab ankles. These soldiers, however, quickly adapted. The men closest to the wall now marched with swords out, watching for Deepest Ones. More than one disembodied arm dropped to the ground near Venli, joining the fallen men and Regals who had lost their footing.

Standing there beside an increasingly angry Raboniel, Venli thought the humans might make it. Led by a grizzled older soldier—and reduced from hundreds to just fifty—they barreled stubbornly onward. Venli found herself cheering them silently, Timbre exulting to the Rhythm of Hope. She cared little for the humans as a whole, but it was impossible to watch such a display of tenacity without being impressed.

This was why her people had dwindled, nearly vanished, during their years at war with the humans. It wasn’t entirely the human access to Shards, or their incredible resources. It was the way they, individually weaker than any listener, worked together. They had no forms, but compensated with training, sacrificing individuality until they were practically spren—having become so good at a single thing, they could never change to another purpose.

They rounded the next loop, only twenty feet from the ground, while Raboniel began shouting for more Deepest Ones. Then a red line of light zipped down from above. The Pursuer had arrived.

He materialized in the very center of the formation of humans, swinging out with arms bearing sharpened carapace. The formation shattered as the men frantically tried to reorient to this new foe—but of course the Pursuer zipped back into the air. He left behind a dummy, a fake carapace version of himself. The humans began stabbing it repeatedly as the real Pursuer appeared with a crash among another segment of the line.

As quickly as that, the tide changed.

The Heavenly Ones found holes in the shield wall to begin stabbing individual humans. The Deepest Ones used the confusion to grab sword arms or trip soldiers. A small group of humans, led by the older veteran, tried to surge forward and dash the rest of the way—but the Regals near Venli had toweled dry, and they managed to unleash a collective bolt of lightning that destroyed the steps in a wide gap right in front of the men.

The human leader, and the men closest to him, dropped with the rubble to die. The rest began a frantic attempt at retreat. It ended quickly.

Raboniel changed her rhythm to one of Relief, then strode back into the mural-lined corridor toward the pillar. Unwilling to watch the final slaughter, Venli turned and scurried alongside her. The sounds of bodies falling—the din of armor against stone—chased them all the way.

*   *   *

It is done, the Sibling whispered to Navani. Your men have fallen.

“Are you certain?” Navani asked. “What do you see?”

I used to be able to watch the entire tower. Now … I see just patches. A small portion of the sixth floor. A room on the fourth floor, with a cage in it. The place nearest the Lady of Pains. She returns. She will kill me now.

The large gemstone her people had been working on—finally primed with Stormlight—began glowing brightly. The light inside it started to shift and dance, furious. Then it drained away, vanishing.

Navani felt a spike of alarm, until the Sibling spoke into her mind. It worked. Melishi … I have hated you … but now I bless you. It worked. I am safe, for now.

Navani let out a relieved breath.

If they reach the gemstone you just infused, the Sibling said, they could corrupt me through it. You will need to destroy it.

“Will that break the shield?” Navani forced out.

No. It will weaken the shield, but that is better than the alternative. You cannot defend this place. Your soldiers on the steps have fallen.

She breathed out, and would remember to burn a prayer for the fallen when she could. But if Teofil had been killed … then the tower was captured. Navani’s only course was to surrender. She would have to hope that the barrier would last long enough either for Dalinar to reach them, or for Navani to find a way to free the Radiants.

Assuming she wasn’t killed. The Fused did not often slaughter indiscriminately, but there were reports of them executing high-ranking lighteyes. That depended on the Fused who led the individual forces, and how much the people resisted.

“Shatter that sapphire,” she said to her scholars. “Destroy the entire fabrial, cage included, and that glass globe. Send people to both the map room and the information vault to burn our maps of the tower. The rest of you, join me. We must find a way to deliver a formal surrender without being killed before we can make our intentions known.”

*   *   *

Raboniel approached the pillar again with some eagerness. Venli stood nearby as the Fused reached up to touch a specific set of gemstones that were embedded in the construction, then began infusing those with Voidlight.

As soon as she’d begun, though, she hesitated. “Something curious is happening here. There is Stormlight in the system. That shouldn’t be possible; the Sibling cannot create it.”

“I thought that Stormlight was what the Radiants, and their fabrials, always used,” Venli said.

“The tower is something else.” She glanced at Venli, noting her confusion—and unlike many Fused, she chose to explain. “The Sibling—the tower, Urithiru—is the child of Honor and Cultivation, created to fight Odium. The place runs on the Sibling’s Light, a mixture of the essences of its parents. Stormlight alone shouldn’t be able to work the tower’s core systems. Stormlight, to the Sibling, is incomplete. Like a key missing several of its teeth.”

“And with Voidlight, you’re using a key … with no teeth?” Venli asked.

“I’m not using a key at all. I’m breaking the lock.” Raboniel put her hands on the pillar, infusing another specific gemstone. “The Sibling is insensate, completely unaware that we are here. That I can determine. I can corrupt them, awaken them to serve us. Just as I expected. But also, there is Stormlight. I feel it, a large amount. Perhaps … it’s simply the power they’re using to work the pumps, or the lifts. Not true parts of the Sibling; systems added later, attached to the construction. Those could take Stormlight alone.…”

Raboniel stopped and stepped back, humming to Craving—a rhythm to indicate confusion or a question. And then a wave of blue light began to expand from the pillar. She stumbled away, and Venli joined her, dashing out into the corridor—where the blue light stopped and seemed to solidify, blocking the way.

Raboniel stepped forward and rested a hand on it. “Solid,” she said. “And powered by Stormlight, judging by the tone…”

Venli anticipated anger. This shield, whatever it was, clearly thwarted whatever the Lady of Wishes was doing. Instead she seemed fascinated.

“Remarkable, truly remarkable,” Raboniel said, tapping the shield with her knife. It clicked like glass when touched. “This is incredible.”

“Does it ruin our plans?” Venli asked.

“Absolutely.”

“And … you don’t mind?”

“Of course not. This is going to be so interesting to crack open. I was right. The answers, the way to end the war, must be here.”

A shimmer of red lightning moved across the ground up the hallway. Venli had seen this before—a spren like lightning running along a surface. Indeed, it materialized into the shape of a small human—not a singer, but a human, with odd eyes and hair that waved in an unseen wind.

Ulim. The first Voidspren she’d ever met, all those years ago. “Lady of Wishes,” he said, performing a flowery bow. “We have located the Blackthorn’s wife, queen of this tower.”

“Oh?” Raboniel asked. “Where was she hiding?”

“A Deepest One—the Caller of Springs—found her near a strange fabrial that is now unfortunately destroyed. The Caller summoned a force and captured Queen Blackthorn, who has come peacefully. She is now asking to speak with whomever was leading our assault. Shall I have her killed?”

“Don’t be wasteful, Ulim,” Raboniel said. “The Blackthorn’s wife will make a very useful pawn. I would have thought better of you.”

“Normally I would be nothing but eager for a new toy,” Ulim said. “But this woman is dangerous and crafty. Reports say she’s the one who created the flying machine that raided Alethkar last month.”

“Then we certainly won’t kill her,” Raboniel said.

“She could be seen as a symbol to the people of this tower…” Ulim said. Then the small spren cocked his head, looking at the shield covering the doorway. “What’s that?”

“You only just noticed it?” Venli asked.

Ulim glanced at her, then turned away, pretending to ignore her. What did he think of Venli now, all these years later? He’d made such promises to her. Was he embarrassed that she’d lived, knowing what a liar he was?

“It is a puzzle,” Raboniel said. “Come. I would meet this queen of the tower.”

*   *   *

Navani composed herself, standing with hands clasped before her, surrounded by singer soldiers. Though the effects of fatigue made her want to droop, she kept her head high. She wished she had chosen a formal havah today, instead of this simple work dress with a gloved hand, but that couldn’t be helped. A queen was a queen, regardless of what she wore. She kept her expression calm, though she wasn’t certain whether she was awaiting imprisonment or death.

They had immediately separated her from the others, naturally, and had taken her arm sheath with its fabrials. She wished she could burn a prayer to the Almighty that her scholars would be kept safe. The only reason to surrender was to protect them and the others of the tower. In this, the Fused had been wise. They’d made it clear time and time again that they didn’t slaughter populations who surrendered. You always knew you had an out. All you had to do was submit.

It was the same lesson that Gavilar and Navani herself had taught many, many years ago. Cities that had joined the unified Alethkar had prospered. Of course, with Gavilar and Dalinar involved, there had always been an explicit addition to that lesson. Fail to submit, and you would be sent the Blackthorn.

With those memories haunting her, it was difficult to evoke any sense of outrage as the enemy soldiers led her down the steps. How could Navani feel outrage at having done to her what she’d willingly done to others? It was the enormous flaw in Gavilar’s reasoning. If their strength justified their rule of Alethkar, then what happened when someone stronger came along? It was a system that ensured there would always be war, a constant clash for rule.

She was able to use such high-minded philosophical thoughts to distract her up until she saw the first bodies. They lay slumped against the wall, in the crook of the steps, men in Roion uniforms. Men with too-young faces, slaughtered as they’d tried to push for the crystal pillar.

Men she’d sent to their deaths. Navani steeled herself, but had to walk through their blood to proceed. Vorin teachings abhorred gambling, and Navani had often been proud that she avoided such games of chance. Yet she gambled with lives, didn’t she?

The blood was pervasive, dribbling down steps, threatening to make her slip. One of her captors placed a strong hand under her arm, as they marched her around and around, passing breaks in the wooden railing where the fighting had grown intense.

At the bottom she found a pile of corpses, including some in Kholin uniforms. Poor Teofil and his men. It seemed they’d almost made it, judging by the fact that a Heavenly One had to fly Navani over a break in the steps where a few last corpses slumped—bespeaking their final moments.

Thank you, Teofil, she thought. And all of you. If the tower had a chance, it came because these men had bought her time. Even if they hadn’t reached the pillar, they had done something remarkable. She would remember that sacrifice.

At the base of the steps, she was marched through the hallway with the murals. As she walked, she found herself proud of how much of a fight they’d put up. Not only Teofil and the soldiers, but the entire tower. Yes, it had taken less than half a day for the Fused to conquer all of Urithiru, but considering Navani’s lack of Radiants and Shards, it was remarkable to have lasted that long.

She felt particularly satisfied with their efforts when she saw the glowing blue light at the end of the hallway, blocking off the way to the pillar room. Odd, that she should feel most a queen in the moments before the position was taken from her.

The soldiers steered her into the larger of the two library rooms, where a tall femalen Fused stood in light armor, looking over papers from one of the many stacks in the room. Navani’s most precious engineering and design secrets. The Fused had a strange hairstyle, with carapace covering nearly her entire head, save for a topknot-style bundle of thick orange singer hair. The way the guards presented Navani made it clear that this was the leader.

The Fused continued to read, barely acknowledging Navani.

“I am ready to discuss terms of surrender,” Navani finally said.

A lithe Regal stepped to the femalen’s side. “Raboniel, Lady of Wishes, is not to be directly addressed by—”

She was interrupted by the Fused saying something. Whatever it was, the Regal didn’t seem to have expected it, for when she spoke again her voice cadence had changed markedly.

“The Lady says, ‘She comes to me as a queen, though she will leave without the title. For now she may speak when she wishes, as befitting her rank.’”

“Then let me offer surrender,” Navani said. “My soldiers have been instructed to turn in their arms, should you approach with the proper sign given—proof that we’ve reached an accord.”

“I will require your Radiants,” the Fused—Raboniel—said through her interpreter. “You will release a proclamation: Anyone harboring a Radiant is subject to harsh punishment. We will search the tower to bring all of them under our care. Your soldiers and officers will be disarmed but spared.

“Your people may continue living in the tower under our laws. All lighteyes—including you—will be made of equal status to darkeyes. You are humans, nothing more, nothing less. The will of a singer must be obeyed immediately, and humans may not carry weapons. Otherwise, I am content to let them continue their occupations—and even engage in trade, a privilege not extended to most humans in Alethkar.”

“I can’t give up the Knights Radiant to execution,” Navani said.

“Then we will kill them all as they lie unconscious,” the Fused said. “And once finished, we will approach you with less lenient terms of surrender. Conversely, we can make an accommodation now, and perhaps your Radiants will live. I cannot promise I won’t change my mind, but I don’t intend to execute them. We simply need to be certain they are properly restrained.”

“They’re unconscious. How much more restraint do they need?”

Raboniel didn’t reply. She flipped through the pages.

“I agree to these terms,” Navani said. “The tower is yours. If your people approach my men with a white flag bearing a circle painted black, they will surrender.”

Several Regals went running with the news, and Navani wished them the wind’s own speed. “What have you done with my scholars? And the soldiers down here in these rooms?”

“Some are dead,” Raboniel said through the interpreter. “But not many.”

Navani closed her eyes. Some? Which of her friends had been killed in this incursion? Was she foolhardy, for resisting as long as she had?

No. Not if it bought us time to put the shield up. She knew very little about the Sibling and this tower, but at least now she had a chance. Only by working with the enemy, pretending to be docile and controlled, would she find opportunity to restore the Radiants.

“You drew these?” Raboniel asked through her interpreter, turning around the pages. They were indeed some of Navani’s sketches—more airships, of a more practical design, now that they better understood the mechanics of flight. They were signed by her seal.

“Yes,” Navani said.

The Fused read through them further. Then, remarkably, she spoke in Alethi—heavily accented, but understandable. “Is it common for human queens of this era to be engineers?”

This startled her attendant Regal, who seemed to not have known this Lady of Wishes could speak Alethi. Or perhaps she was surprised to hear one so high speak to a human.

“I have unusual hobbies,” Navani said.

Raboniel folded the sheet of paper and finally met Navani’s eyes. “They are remarkable. I would like to hire you.”

“… Hire me?” Navani asked, taken aback.

“You are no longer a queen, but you are obviously a talented engineer. I am told the scholars of this tower respect you. So, I would hire you to work on fabrial projects for me. I assure you, being in my employ will be a far more rewarding job than carrying water or washing clothing.”

What game is this? Navani thought. Surely this Fused didn’t actually expect Navani to design fabrials for the enemy?

“Carrying water or washing clothing is fine work,” Navani said. “I’ve done both before in my life. Neither will involve giving secrets to an enemy who, I’m afraid, will inevitably use them to kill and conquer my people.”

“True,” Raboniel said. “You are not prideful. I respect that. But consider my offer before rejecting it. If you are close to me, you would have a much easier time tracking what I’m doing, spying on my projects. You will also have greater opportunity to sneak information out to your husband, in hope of an eventual rescue. I know many things about Stormlight and Voidlight that you do not. Pay attention, and I suspect you’d learn more from me than you’d give up.”

Navani felt her mouth go dry, searching the Fused’s red eyes, glowing faintly from her corrupted soul. Storms. Raboniel said it all so calmly. This creature was ancient, thousands of years old. What secrets must her mind hold.…

Careful, Navani thought to herself. If she’s thousands of years old, she has had thousands of years to practice manipulating people.

“I will consider the offer,” Navani said.

“Refer to me as ‘Ancient One’ or ‘Lady of Wishes,’” Raboniel said, “as you no longer have the rank to ignore my title. I will put you with your scholars. Discuss it together, then inform me of your decision.”

The soldiers led Navani away. And just like that, she had lost another throne.