A day after being murdered in a brutal fashion, Shallan found that she was feeling much better. The sense of oppression had left her, and even her horror seemed distant. What lingered was that single glimpse she’d seen in the mirror: a glimmer of the Unmade’s presence, beyond the plane of the reflection.
The mirrors in the tailor’s shop didn’t show such proclivities; she had checked every one. Just in case, she’d given a drawing of the thing she’d seen to the others, and warned them to watch.
Today, she strolled into the little kitchen, which was beside the rear workroom. Adolin ate flatbread and curry while King Elhokar sat at the room’s table, earnestly … writing something? No, he was drawing.
Shallan rested fond fingers on Adolin’s shoulder and enjoyed his grin in response. Then she rounded to peek over the king’s shoulder. He was doing a map of the city, with the palace and the Oathgate platform. It wasn’t half bad.
“Anyone seen the bridgeman?” Elhokar asked.
“Here,” Kaladin said, strolling in from the workroom. Yokska, her husband, and her maid were out shopping for more food, using spheres that Elhokar had provided. Food was apparently still for sale in the city, if you had the spheres to pay.
“I,” Elhokar said, “have devised a plan for how to proceed in this city.”
Shallan shared a look with Adolin, who shrugged. “What do you suggest, Your Majesty?”
“Thanks to the Lightweaver’s excellent reconnaissance,” the king said, “it is evident my wife is being held captive by her own guards.”
“We don’t know that for certain, Your Majesty,” Kaladin said. “It sounded like the queen has succumbed to whatever is affecting the guards.”
“Either way, she is in need of rescue,” Elhokar said. “Either we must sneak into the palace for her and little Gavinor, or we must rally a military force to help us capture the location by strength of arms.” He tapped his map of the city with his pen. “The Oathgate, however, remains our priority. Brightness Davar, I want you to investigate this Cult of Moments. Find out how they’re using the Oathgate platform.”
Yokska had confirmed that each night, some members of the cult set a blazing fire on top of the platform. They guarded the place all hours of the day.
“If you could join whatever ritual or event they are performing,” the king said, “you would be within feet of the Oathgate. You could transport the entire plateau to Urithiru, and let our armies there deal with the cult.
“In case that is not viable, Adolin and I—in the guise of important lighteyes from the Shattered Plains—shall contact the lighteyed houses in the city who maintain private guard forces. We shall gather their support, perhaps revealing our true identities, and put together an army for assaulting the palace, if needed.”
“And me?” Kaladin asked.
“I don’t like the sound of this Azure person. See what you can find out about him and his Wall Guard.”
Kaladin nodded, then grunted.
“It’s a good plan, Elhokar,” Adolin said. “Nice work.”
A simple compliment probably should not have made a king beam like it did. Elhokar even drew a gloryspren—and notably, it didn’t seem different from ordinary ones.
“But there is something we have to face,” Adolin continued. “Have you listened to the list of charges that ardent—the one who got executed—made against the queen?”
“I … Yes.”
“Ten glyphs,” Adolin said, “denouncing Aesudan’s excess. Wasting food while people starved. Increasing taxes, then throwing lavish parties for her ardents. Elhokar, this started long before the Everstorm.”
“We can … ask her,” the king said. “Once she is safe. Something must have been wrong. Aesudan was always proud, and always ambitious, but never gluttonous.” He eyed Adolin. “I know that Jasnah says I shouldn’t have married her—that Aesudan was too hungry for power. Jasnah never understood. I needed Aesudan. Someone with strength…” He took a deep breath, then stood up. “We mustn’t waste time. The plan. Do you agree with it?”
“I like it,” Shallan said.
Kaladin nodded. “It’s too general, but it’s at least a line of attack. Additionally, we need to trace the grain in the city. Yokska says the lighteyes provide it, but she also says the palace stores are closed.”
“You think someone has a Soulcaster?” Adolin asked.
“I think this city has too many secrets,” Kaladin said.
“Adolin and I shall ask the lighteyes, and see if they know,” Elhokar said, then looked to Shallan. “The Cult of Moments?”
“I’ll get on it,” she said. “I need a new coat anyway.”
She slipped out of the building again as Veil. She wore the trousers and her coat, though that now had a hole in the back. Ishnah had been able to wash the blood off, but Veil still wanted to replace it. For now, she covered the hole with a Lightweaving.
Veil sauntered down the street, and found herself feeling increasingly confident. Back in Urithiru, she’d still been struggling to get her coat on straight, so to speak. She winced as she thought of her trips through the bars, making a fool of herself. You didn’t need to prove how much you could drink in order to look tough—but that was the sort of thing you couldn’t learn without wearing the coat, living in it.
She turned toward the market, where she hoped to get a feel for Kholinar’s people. She needed to know how they thought before she could begin to understand how the Cult of Moments had come to be, and therefore how to infiltrate it.
This market was very different from those at Urithiru, or the night markets of Kharbranth. First off, this one was obviously ancient. These worn, weathered shops felt like they’d been here for the first Desolation. These were stones smoothed by the touch of a million fingers, or indented by the press of thousands of passing feet. Awnings bleached by the progression of day after day.
The street was wide, and not crowded. Some stalls were empty, and the remaining merchants didn’t shout at her as she passed. These seemed effects of the smothered sensation everyone felt—the feeling of a city besieged.
Yokska served only men, and Veil wouldn’t have wanted to reveal herself to the woman anyway. So she stopped at a clothier and tried on some new coats. She chatted with the woman who ran the accounts—her husband was the actual tailor—and got some suggestions on where to look for a coat matching her current one, then stepped back out onto the street.
Soldiers in light blue patrolled here, the glyphs on their uniforms proclaiming them to be of House Velalant. Yokska had described their brightlord as a minor player in the city until so many lighteyes had vanished into the palace.
Veil shivered, remembering the line of corpses. Adolin and Elhokar were fairly certain those were the remnants of a distant Kholin and his attendants—a man named Kaves, who had often tried to gain power in the city. Neither were sad to see him go, but it whispered of a continuing mystery. More than thirty people had gone to meet with the queen, many more powerful than Kaves. What had happened to them?
She passed an assortment of vendors peddling the usual range of necessities and curiosities, from ceramics to dining wares, to fine knives. It was nice to see that here, the soldiers had imposed some semblance of order. Perhaps rather than fixating on the closed stalls, Veil should have appreciated how many were still open.
The third clothing shop finally had a coat she liked, of the same style as her old one—white and long, past her knees. She paid to have it taken in, then casually asked the seamstress about the city’s grain.