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Szeth of Shinovar leaves the Skybreaker fortress at sunset with twenty other squires. The calm waters of the Purelake now bristle with dozens of wooden poles jammed into fissures of the lake bed, varying from five to thirty feet tall, each topped with a knobby cluster of small pouches. Master Warren — an Azish man wearing the bare-chested patterned-cloak garb of a Marabethian lawkeeper rather than his usual layered robes — explains the test. Each pole's pouches carry powder of a single colour; the squires fight by throwing pouches at one another's uniforms, may not use other weapons, and may not leave the contest area. At sunset he will count hits: four points off for every different colour staining a uniform, one more for each repeat. The winner is the squire with the fewest points lost. Without Nin's presence to confirm, the masters still speak of the Desolation in *ifs* and *mights.*

Szeth Lashes himself upward with the rest. The chance to dance the Lashings without killing anyone calls to him; it is like his youth, training with the Honorblades. *No evil today, sword-nimi,* he tells the sword strapped at his back. *Just a challenge.* The sword does not understand. He notices for the first time that his Stormlight is lasting markedly longer than it used to, and concludes that a spren-bonded Radiant is more efficient with it than a wielder of an Honorblade.

Then a four-squire pack — well practised, fixating on the squire whose uniform is still mostly clean — locks onto him. Szeth dives and twists; he snatches a pole as he skims the lake, snaps it off with a partial Lashing to lighten it, and tucks the ten-foot staff under his arm. He chooses his moment, banks into a smooth predictable turn that draws every thrown bag in the pack — and bats them away with the staff, even returning one into the eyes of the leader, a man named Ty. While the pack's pouches are spent, Szeth charges them. He grabs one squire by the shirt and uses her as a shield against an outside attack, kicks her into a companion to streak them both with red, then seizes another and tries to fling him away with a Lashing — and discovers that a person actively holding Stormlight resists being Lashed directly. He can still drag the man along by Lashing himself and hauling him. The pack-mate, momentum mishandled, jerks in the air and is pelted by half a dozen bags from outsiders.

His reserves drain. Ty points him out to the others: *get him!* The sword approves. He dives instead of climbing, getting in among the spread-out squires so that their cross-fire endangers them more than him. Pouches strike his back, side, third hit. He scatters fish along the surface, shoots upward, and the tempest within him dies. His glow vanishes. The cold takes him. He arcs through a cloud of multicolour dust, loosely fastened spirit trailing the now-familiar afterimage, and crashes into the shallow Purelake. The others pelt him with one more round of pouches for good measure. The sun's last sliver vanishes; Warren calls the test over. *Wow,* the sword says. *I kind of feel bad for you.*

Two highspren manifest near him in the dimming light — small slits in the air, behind which a black field full of stars is exposed, the substance of reality bending around them as they move. Szeth bows his head. Then it occurs to him to ask what the rules had actually been.

He swims under the surface back to the bank, climbs out clean, and walks up to the masters streaming with water. *I am sorry to have won this contest,* he tells them, *as I did the one with the prison.* Ty — five spots, not bad — is incredulous. Szeth holds out his hands: the rules said the winner was the one with the fewest marks on his uniform, and his swim has washed his clean. Warren and Ki share a look. *There is always one who notices that,* Warren tells him; loopholes are exploitable but dangerous to rely upon. The highspren agree. Other squires protest that he used a weapon and physically grappled people; Szeth points out he attacked no one with the pole and that physical contact was not forbidden — and that he cannot help it if those he releases cannot manage their own Lashings. The masters do not object. Ki leans in to Warren: *he is beyond the skill of these. I hadn't realised…* Warren tells him he shall soon have his spren.

*Not soon,* Szeth says. *Right now.* He will say the Third Ideal this night, choosing to follow the law. *I —*

*No,* a voice interrupts.

A figure stands on the low wall of the courtyard, lanterns lifting to show dark Makabaki skin marked by a white crescent birthmark on the right cheek and a striking uniform of silver and black. Nin-son-God, Nale, Nakku, Nalan — a hundred names across all Roshar, the Illuminator, the Judge, a founder of humankind, a man ascended to divinity. The Herald of Justice has returned. *Before you swear, Szeth-son-Neturo,* he tells him, *there are things you need to understand. Things you all must understand.* He orders the masters and the worthier squires to gather gemstone reserves and travel packs and leave the leakier squires behind; they will go a long way. *Tonight, Just One?* Ki asks. *Tonight.* It is time, he says, for them to learn the two greatest secrets that he knows.