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Szeth of Shinovar — once the Assassin in White — has been reborn. Mostly. Nin, Herald of Justice, restored him with a fabrial after his defeat in the storm, but only just in time; his spirit did not properly reattach. The proof shows in a faint glowing afterimage that trails him when he moves, visible to those close to the Surges. The other five hopefuls assembled with him on the stone field before the Skybreaker fortress overlooking the Purelake keep their distance from him — for the afterimage, perhaps, or for the black sword in a silver sheath strapped to his back.

The sword is the second strange thing. Sword-nimi, as Szeth has learned to address it, speaks in his mind with an eager voice that is neither distinctly male nor female. It is delighted by the lake — Vasher said there were magic fish! — and keeps asking Szeth to draw it. Szeth reminds it that he has been warned not to, save in extreme emergency and only with a great deal of Stormlight in him, lest the sword feed on his soul. The sword huffs that it would never do that; it only destroys evil things, and Szeth is not evil. The sword was a test Nin gave him, and even after weeks of carrying it Szeth does not understand what the test is for.

Behind him, Nin's order arranges itself — some fifty Skybreakers here, with dozens more out on missions. An entire order of Knights Radiant has survived the Recreance, waiting two thousand years for the Desolation and quietly replacing its dead. Szeth intends to join them: take their training, then turn it on those who falsely exiled him from Shinovar. He half-wonders whether he can be trusted with the sword of justice. The sword interjects that he is super trustworthy, and a good judge of people besides. Szeth reminds it he was not speaking to it.

Mentioning the voices in his head brings them again to attention — the whispers of the dead he has killed. Nin did not heal his madness, calling it an effect of his connection to the powers, trembles from the Spiritual Realm. Szeth thought that having died and been forced back would strip the voices of their hold on him. But still, in the night, he weeps.

A tall, imposing golden-haired master called Ki steps forward in the Marabethian dress local lawkeepers wear — patterned shoulder cloak, colourful wrap-skirt, no shirt but a band of cloth across her chest. Skybreakers clothe themselves as the local law does, wherever they are. She addresses the hopefuls in Azish: each of them has been vouched for by a full Skybreaker, travelled with the order on a mission, and been judged worthy of the First Ideal. They are to speak it now. *Life before death. Strength before weakness. Journey before destination.* The other five belt it; Szeth whispers it to the voices in the dark, his own promise that justice is coming. He had hoped that speaking the oath would restore his ability to draw Stormlight, lost with his previous weapon. It does not. The sphere in his pocket gives him nothing.

Ki tells them that speaking the Ideal officially pardons them for any past misdeeds — the order has paperwork signed by the proper regional authorities. To progress they will need a Skybreaker master to take them as squire, after which they may speak the Second Ideal and learn the Lashings. A full Skybreaker is only made by bonding a highspren and speaking the Third. The highspren, not the masters, will judge them.

When no one else asks, Szeth does. He has been told there are five Ideals — are they to know them? Of course, Ki answers, and walks him through the five. The First is the Ideal of Radiance, which he has spoken. The Second is the Ideal of Justice: an oath to seek and administer it. The Third is the Ideal of Dedication, requiring a bonded highspren and a sworn dedication to a greater truth — a chosen code; with it comes Division, the second and more dangerous of their two Surges. The Fourth is the Ideal of Crusade — a personal quest, completed to the satisfaction of one's highspren, that elevates the swearer to mastership. *Cleanse Shinovar,* Szeth thinks. The Fifth is the Ideal of Law: one must *become* law, become truth. No one has spoken it in centuries.

Szeth presses on the last. Nin taught him that law must be external to fallible men — how then can a man become law? Another master answers that law must come from somewhere, but that the Fifth is too distant a goal for a hopeful to fix on; most Skybreakers go their whole lives at the Third.

Ki asks whether he wishes also to be excused from the Marabethian path on the grounds of his strange history. Nin had originally thought he might skip ahead to the Third because of what he had done as the Assassin in White, but the Herald is no longer here to judge — he has abandoned Szeth once already, at Tashikk after the Everstorm proved his hunting of other Surgebinders had been wrong, and gone off to seek guidance. Szeth will walk the same path the others do. *It is orderly,* he answers, *and you have explained it well. Why would I complain?* The other hopefuls seem to like that.

Ki Lashes him into the sky herself; for an instant he feels again the freedom of flight, as he had in his earliest days with an Honorblade before he became Truthless — *no,* he reminds himself, *you were never Truthless. Remember that.* A second Skybreaker catches him with an opposing Lashing and leaves him hovering. A pair of them take him under the arms, and the whole order soars off through the air toward the place of the test, no longer caring about the secrecy that had hidden them for so long. The sword approves: it likes it up here, where you can see everything. Szeth asks whether it can actually see. Not like a man, the sword says. *You see all kinds of things, Szeth. Except, unfortunately, how useful I am.*