“Your Majesty?” Dalinar said, starting. “I’m glad you could make the meeting. Are you feeling better?”
“Why do they refuse you, Uncle?” Elhokar asked, ignoring the question. “Do they think perhaps you will try to usurp their thrones?”
Dalinar drew in his breath sharply, and his guards looked embarrassed to be standing nearby. They backed up to give him and the king privacy.
“Elhokar…” Dalinar said.
“You likely think I say this in spite,” the king said, poking his head into the room, noting his mother, then looking back at Dalinar. “I don’t. You are better than I am. A better soldier, a better person, and certainly a better king.”
“You do yourself a disservice, Elhokar. You must—”
“Oh, save your platitudes, Dalinar. For once in your life, just be honest with me.”
“You think I haven’t been?”
Elhokar raised his hand and lightly touched his own chest. “Perhaps you have been, at times. Perhaps the liar here is me—lying to tell myself I could do this, that I could be a fraction of the man my father was. No, don’t interrupt me, Dalinar. Let me have my say. Voidbringers? Ancient cities full of wonder? The Desolations?” Elhokar shook his head. “Perhaps … perhaps I’m a fine king. Not extraordinary, but not an abject failure. But in the face of these events, the world needs better than fine.”
There seemed a fatalism to his words, and that sent a worried shiver through Dalinar. “Elhokar, what are you saying?”
Elhokar strode into the chamber and called down to those at the bottom of the rows of seats. “Mother, Brightness Teshav, would you witness something for me?”
Storms, no, Dalinar thought, hurrying after Elhokar. “Don’t do this, son.”
“We all must accept the consequences of our actions, Uncle,” Elhokar said. “I’ve been learning this very slowly, as I can be as dense as a stone.”
“But—”
“Uncle, am I your king?” Elhokar demanded.
“Yes.”
“Well, I shouldn’t be.” He knelt, shocking Navani and causing her to pull to a stop three-quarters of the way up the steps. “Dalinar Kholin,” Elhokar said in a loud voice, “I swear to you now. There are princes and highprinces. Why not kings and highkings? I give an oath, immutable and witnessed, that I accept you as my monarch. As Alethkar is to me, I am to you.”
Dalinar breathed out, looking to Navani’s aghast face, then down to his nephew, kneeling as a vassal on the floor.
“You did ask for this, Uncle,” Elhokar said. “Not specifically in words, but it is the only place we could have gone. You have slowly been taking command ever since you decided to trust those visions.”
“I’ve tried to include you,” Dalinar said. Silly, impotent words. He should be better than that. “You are right, Elhokar. I’m sorry.”
“Are you?” Elhokar asked. “Are you really?”
“I’m sorry,” Dalinar said, “for your pain. I’m sorry that I didn’t handle this better. I’m sorry that this … this must be. Before you make this oath, tell me what you expect that it entails?”
“I’ve already said the words,” Elhokar said, growing red faced. “Before witnesses. It is done. I’ve—”
“Oh, stand up,” Dalinar said, grabbing him by the arm and hauling him to his feet. “Don’t be dramatic. If you really want to swear this oath, I’ll let you. But let’s not pretend you can sweep into a room, shout a few words, and assume it’s a legal contract.”
Elhokar pulled his arm free and rubbed it. “Won’t even let me abdicate with dignity.”
“You’re not abdicating,” Navani said, joining them. She shot a glare at the guards, who stood watching with slack jaws, and they grew white at the glare. She pointed at them as if to say, Not a word of this to anyone else. “Elhokar, you intend to shove your uncle into a position above you. He’s right to ask. What will this mean for Alethkar?”
“I…” Elhokar swallowed. “He should give up his lands to his heir. Dalinar is a king of somewhere else, after all. Dalinar, Highking of Urithiru, maybe the Shattered Plains.” He stood straighter, speaking more certainly. “Dalinar must stay out of the direct management of my lands. He can give me commands, but I decide how to see them accomplished.”
“It sounds reasonable,” Navani said, glancing at Dalinar.
Reasonable, but gut-wrenching. The kingdom he’d fought for—the kingdom he’d forged in pain, exhaustion, and blood—now rejected him.
This is my land now, Dalinar thought. This tower covered in coldspren. “I can accept these terms, though at times I might need to give commands to your highprinces.”
“As long as they’re in your domain,” Elhokar said, a hint of stubbornness to his voice, “I consider them under your authority. While they visit Urithiru or the Shattered Plains, command as you wish. When they return to my kingdom, you must go through me.” He looked to Dalinar, and then glanced down, as if embarrassed to be making demands.
“Very well,” Dalinar said. “Though we need to work this out with scribes before we make the change officially. And before we go too far, we should make certain there is still an Alethkar for you to rule.”
“I’ve been thinking the same thing. Uncle, I want to lead our forces to Alethkar and recapture our homeland. Something is wrong in Kholinar. More than these riots or my wife’s supposed behavior, more than the spanreeds going still. The enemy is doing something in the city. I’ll take an army to stop it, and save the kingdom.”
Elhokar? Leading troops? Dalinar had been imagining himself leading a force, cutting through the Voidbringer ranks, sweeping them from Alethkar and marching into Kholinar to restore order.
Truth was, though, it didn’t make sense for either of them to lead such an assault. “Elhokar,” Dalinar said, leaning in. “I’ve been considering something. The Oathgate is attached to the palace itself. We don’t need to march an army all the way to Alethkar. All we need to do is restore that device! Once it works, we can transport our forces into the city to secure the palace, restore order, and fend off the Voidbringers.”
“Get into the city,” Elhokar said. “Uncle, to do that we might need an army in the first place!”
“No,” Dalinar said. “A small team could reach Kholinar far faster than an army. As long as there was a Radiant with them, they could sneak in, restore the Oathgate, and open the way for the rest of us.”
Elhokar perked up. “Yes! I’ll do it, Uncle. I’ll take a team and reclaim our home. Aesudan is there; if the rioting is still happening, she’s fighting against it.”
That wasn’t what the reports—before they’d cut off—had suggested to Dalinar. If anything, the queen was the cause of the riots. And he certainly hadn’t been intending Elhokar to go on this mission himself.
Consequences. The lad was earnest, as he’d always been. Besides, Elhokar seemed to have learned something from his near death at the hands of assassins. He was certainly humbler now than he’d been in years past.
“It is fitting,” Dalinar said, “that their king should be the one who saves them. I will see that you have whatever resources you need, Elhokar.”
Glowing gloryspren orbs burst around Elhokar. He grinned at them. “I only seem to see those when I’m around you, Uncle. Funny. For all that I should resent you, I don’t. It’s hard to resent a man who is doing his best. I’ll do it. I’ll save Alethkar. I need one of your Radiants. The hero, preferably.”