Dalinar stepped into the room. The scarred ardent jumped, then relaxed when he saw it was Dalinar.
“Do we need to have this conversation again, Dalinar?” he asked, turning back to his packing.
“No,” Dalinar said. “I didn’t actually come looking for you. I want to find a man who lived here. A madman who claimed to be one of the Heralds.”
Kadash cocked his head. “Ah, yes. The one who had a Shardblade?”
“All of the other patients at the monastery are accounted for, safe at Urithiru, but he vanished somehow. I was hoping to see if his room offered any clues to what became of him.”
Kadash looked at him, gauging his sincerity. Then the ardent sighed, rising. “That’s a different devotary from mine,” he said, “but I have occupancy records here. I should be able to tell you which room he was in.”
“Thank you.”
Kadash looked through a stack of ledgers. “Shash building,” he finally said, pointing absently out the window. “That one right there. Room thirty-seven. Insah ran the facility; her records will list details of the madman’s treatment. If her departure from the warcamp was anything like mine, she’ll have left most of her paperwork behind.” He gestured toward the safe and his packing.
“Thank you,” Dalinar said. He moved to leave.
“You … think the madman was actually a Herald, don’t you?”
“I think it’s likely.”
“He spoke with a rural Alethi accent, Dalinar.”
“And he looked Makabaki,” Dalinar replied. “That alone is an oddity, wouldn’t you say?”
“Immigrant families are not so uncommon.”
“Ones with Shardblades?”
Kadash shrugged.
“Let’s say I could actually find one of the Heralds,” Dalinar said. “Let’s say we could confirm his identity, and you accepted that proof. Would you believe him if he told you the same things I have?”
Kadash sighed.
“Surely you’d want to know if the Almighty were dead, Kadash,” Dalinar said, stepping back into the room. “Tell me you wouldn’t.”
“You know what it would mean? It would mean there is no spiritual basis for your rule.”
“I know.”
“And the things you did in conquering Alethkar?” Kadash said. “No divine mandate, Dalinar. Everyone accepts what you did because your victories were proof of the Almighty’s favor. Without him … then what are you?”
“Tell me, Kadash. Would you really rather not know?”
Kadash looked at the spanreed, which had stopped writing. He shook his head. “I don’t know, Dalinar. It certainly would be easier.”
“Isn’t that the problem? What has any of this ever required of men like me? What has it required of any of us?”
“It required you to be what you are.”
“Which is self-fulfilling,” Dalinar said. “You were a swordsman, Kadash. Would you have gotten better without opponents to face? Would you have gotten stronger without weights to lift? Well, in Vorinism, we’ve spent centuries avoiding the opponents and the weights.”
Again, Kadash glanced at the spanreed.
“What is it?” Dalinar asked.
“I left most of my spanreeds behind,” Kadash explained, “when I went with you toward the center of the Shattered Plains. I took only the spanreed linked to an ardent transfer station in Kholinar. I thought that would be enough, but it no longer works. I’ve been forced to use intermediaries in Tashikk.”
Kadash lifted a box onto the desk and opened it. Inside were five more spanreeds, with blinking rubies, indicating that someone had been trying to contact Kadash.
“These are links to the leaders of Vorinism in Jah Keved, Herdaz, Kharbranth, Thaylenah, and New Natanan,” Kadash said, counting them off. “They had a meeting via reeds today, discussing the nature of the Desolation and the Everstorm. And perhaps you. I mentioned I was going to recover my own spanreeds today. Apparently, their meeting has made them all very eager to question me further.”
He let the silence hang between them, measured out by the five blinking red lights.
“What of the one that is writing?” Dalinar asked.
“A line to the Palanaeum and the heads of Vorin research there. They’ve been working on the Dawnchant, using the clues Brightness Navani gave them from your visions. What they’ve sent me are relevant passages from ongoing translations.”
“Proof,” Dalinar said. “You wanted solid proof that what I’ve been seeing is real.” He strode forward, grabbing Kadash by the shoulders. “You waited for that reed first, before answering the leaders of Vorinism?”
“I wanted all the facts in hand.”
“So you know that the visions are real!”
“I long ago accepted that you weren’t mad. These days, it’s more a question of who might be influencing you.”
“Why would the Voidbringers give me these visions?” Dalinar said. “Why would they grant us great powers, like the one that flew us here? It’s not rational, Kadash.”
“Neither is what you’re saying about the Almighty.” He held up a hand to cut off Dalinar. “I don’t want to have this argument again. Before, you asked me for proof that we are following the Almighty’s precepts, right?”
“All I asked for and all I want is the truth.”
“We have it already. I’ll show you.”
“I look forward to it,” Dalinar said, walking to the door. “But Kadash? In my painful experience, the truth may be simple, but it is rarely easy.”
Dalinar crossed to the next building over and counted down the rooms. Storms, this building felt like a prison. Most of the doors hung open, revealing uniform chambers beyond: each had one tiny window, a slab for a bed, and a thick wooden door. The ardents knew what was best for the sick—they had access to all the world’s latest research in all fields—but was it really necessary to lock madmen away like this?
Number thirty-seven was still bolted shut. Dalinar rattled the door, then threw his shoulder against it. Storms, it was thick. Without thinking he put his hand to the side and tried summoning his Shardblade. Nothing happened.
What are you doing? the Stormfather demanded.
“Sorry,” Dalinar said, shaking his hand out. “Habit.”
He crouched down and tried peeking under the door, then called out, suddenly horrified by the idea that they might have simply left the man in here to starve. That couldn’t have happened, could it?
“My powers,” Dalinar said, rising. “Can I use them?”
Binding things? the Stormfather said. How would that open a door? You are a Bondsmith; you bring things together, you do not divide them.
“And my other Surge?” Dalinar said. “That Radiant in the vision made stone warp and ripple.”
You are not ready. Besides, that Surge is different for you than it is for a Stoneward.
Well, from what Dalinar could see underneath the door, there seemed to be light in this room. Perhaps it had a window to the outside he could use.
On his way out, he poked through the ardent chambers until he found an office like Kadash’s. He didn’t find any keys, though the desk still had pens and ink sitting on it. They’d left in haste, so there was a good chance the wall safe contained records—but of course, Dalinar couldn’t get in. Storms. He missed having a Shardblade.
He rounded the outside of the building to check the window, then immediately felt silly for spending so much time trying to get through the door. Somebody else had already cut a hole in the stone out here, using the distinctive, clean slices of a Shardblade.