Summary:Words of Radiance/Chapter 70

Whether this was Tanavast's design or not, millennia have passed without Rayse taking the life of another of the sixteen. While I mourn for the great suffering Rayse has caused, I do not believe we could hope for a better outcome than this.

Characters

• Kaladin (Point of View)
• Shallan (Point of View)
• Adolin (Mentioned only)
• Jasnah (Mentioned only)
• Pattern

Plot Summary

Ishakach 1173

Kaladin and Shallan flee as they are chased by a chasmfiend. Shallan choses a path and orders Kaladin to follow her. They stop and Kaladin covers his stormlight, and he realizes that she lured the chasmfiend to a fresh corpse for food. Shallan decides she wants to see the chasmfiend, and get close to take a look at it as it fills the chasm and has small glowing spren around it like the spren that follow skyeels. They leave before the chasmfiend finishes its meal.

Shallan lets Kaladin lead, though she tries to keep track of where she is, and dwells on the chasmfiend. She grows tired now that all her stormlight is drained. Kaladin says they should stop so they don't risk getting lost and going the wrong direction, and wants to wait until daybreak to get their bearings. They banter for a bit, with less antagonism, and Shallan sketches their path through the chasms in the form of a map, which impresses Kaladin.

Kaladin wakes her up after a short sleep, before daybreak. They set out, and when the sun rises, they think they are going the right direction. They banter further, with Shallan dishing out lighthearted insults while Kaladin resists replying in kind unlike his earlier behavior. Kaladin asks why Shallan came to the Shattered Plains and she becomes serious, replying that she was trying to continue Jasnah's important research, and that Adolin was an added bonus. Kaladin asks if she was there to investigate the strange structures that they saw and she tries to dissemble but he sees through it, and explains his original suspicions of her. She says that she wants the parshmen exiled before they betray the Alethi, and he replies that they might be replaced with regular Alethi slaves and she empathizes with his former plight as a slave. Shallan tries to be lighthearted but Kaladin will have none of it, though he tries to not argue either. Kaladin explains that he thinks she is a typical pampered sheltered lighteyes which Shallan rephrases back as self-contradictory and convoluted, and Kaladin sees the flaws in his argument. Shallan tells Kaladin that she won't harm the Kholins and she is sincere in trying to prevent disaster, and he accepts this. Kaladin then checks their bearings and realize they are going the wrong direction.

Notes

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