POV: dalinar
Summary
Two days after the Veden traitors are broken, Dalinar stands at the war table at Laqqi with Szeth disguised behind him in Cobalt Guard colours. The little squares on the maps — armies, supply chains, troop logistics — once thrilled him; now even that has dropped beneath him into a deeper question. *How do we win? Truly win, not merely gain an advantage for a time?*
His generals and scribes give their reports. Teshav confirms that the Thaylen ships supported the southern Alethi retreat through a chain of fortresses, regrouping at Karanak with virtually no losses; Prince Kmakl reports the Veden ships are locked in port unless the Fused and Skybreakers give them heavy air support; Omal reports the Veden betrayers in Emul were nearly eliminated, the supply dumps untouched, the king not rescued. Jasnah approves Dalinar's handling; Noura speaks for the Azish emperor in agreement, regretting Taravangian as ally while confirming his treachery is fully prosecuted in Azish memory. Kharbranth — now under Taravangian's daughter Savrahalidem — has disavowed its former ruler and proclaimed itself neutral; Dalinar orders a blockade just in case rather than wasting an invasion on a small target.
What still gnaws at him is that Taravangian had been subtle for months, then let himself be captured in Urithiru for no apparent gain. *His armies in Jah Keved seem not to care much about him. The Veden highprinces will be happy to put their own men in charge.* Maybe the gain was the chaos itself — a throw at coalition collapse that would have stranded everyone in Azimir without Oathgates and let the singers crush them. He proposes pushing the Emul offensive until Urithiru is restored; the monarchs assent, with Kmakl subject to the guildmasters' approval and Jasnah reserving the right to see detailed plans. The Mink will run the campaign. The cost of writing off Alethkar for years sits like a knife in Dalinar's chest.
Dalinar steps outside for fresh air, looks in on little Gav with his governess, and lets himself think of Evi — *like a familiar seat by the fire* now, no longer the novelty her returned memory was at first. He returns to find Jasnah at the wine bar, asking pointedly why he is stepping away. He tells her plainly: the touch-Connection he made with Nalan showed him he is a Bondsmith weapon he has barely begun to investigate, and his greater value is to learn what he can really do — to reforge the Oathpact if possible, or otherwise to find some way to force Odium to a real accord. Wit joins in: Rayse agreed to a contest of champions over a year ago but has never set terms and won't, as long as he believes he is winning. They must frighten him.
Jasnah is willing, with cautions — her own first ventures into Soulcasting were deadly at times. She also notices Dalinar's narrowed glances at Kmakl, teases him about the bureaucracy that hems in Fen and the Azish emperor, and warns him that *the days of absolute power in one person's hands will likely soon pass us by; I wouldn't be surprised if I'm the last true Alethi monarch.* Dalinar mutters his preference for a king to be a king, but the argument can wait.
Lyn the Windrunner arrives with the latest scouting of Urithiru. She stepped through the invisible barrier herself and *dropped like she'd taken a hit straight to the jaw*; from a distance the tower looks calm, with figures in blue holding up glyph signs reading *patience* and *progress*. Dalinar thanks her and quietly tells her to dispatch another team to watch the tower from hidden range overnight — *the enemy has Lightweavers, or at least something similar.* The weight does not lift.
Meanwhile, at the strong-wine end of the bar, Highprince Ruthar is reddening as Jasnah makes a deliberate show of suggesting troop arrangements to the Mink in front of the whole tent. She is, Dalinar realises, putting on a play for Ruthar — and he bites: a too-loud complaint about *a godless wh—* he chokes off as the tent goes still.
*Wit,* Jasnah says coolly. Wit strides forward and delivers tiered insults at her cues — *harsher / harsher* — culminating in publicly naming Ruthar's children, the older son's broken arm last month, and the implication that the man is a sadist and a coward who hurts only those who cannot fight back. Ruthar roars for trial by combat against the fool or his champion. Wit accepts and immediately exercises the right to choose a champion. Dalinar tries to stop the duel — *you've been baited, killing a Queen's Wit costs you your title* — but Ruthar, drunk and stripped of patience, declares he has nothing left to lose.
Wit hands his sheathed thin silvery sword hilt-first to the queen. She draws it, steps into striking range, and trades passes with Ruthar — promising student-level, no more. Ruthar throws his sword down rather than face a woman, *I will not face a woman in combat. It is demeaning.* Jasnah stabs him through the throat. Renarin hurries in on cue and heals the wound before he can bleed out. Dalinar catches Fisk's eye; the Cobalt Guard silently locks the tent down until the news can be managed.
Standing over Ruthar on the floor, Jasnah enumerates his three insults of the night, declares him legally dead by the duel he provoked, strips him of his title, and passes the princedom to his estranged eldest son — *who has been speaking quite frankly with Wit recently* and whom Wit cheerfully informs the bleeding former highprince is not his biological child. Ruthar is barred from his own camp and pointed at recruitment or the queen's poorhouses.
Dalinar tells Jasnah plainly he found the whole thing distasteful, and not only because she did not warn him; she tells him plainly *that is why I didn't warn you*, and slides across the table a drafted law forbidding trial by sword in Alethkar — to be argued for using her own staged duel as the exemplar. *Ruthar's blood will be the last such spilled* in her kingdom, and the court will know that its first queen does what needs to be done herself. *You cannot tame a feral axehound with kind words. You use raw meat.*
Dalinar tucks his anger away, lets Fisk release the lockdown, and turns to leave. Renarin hurries after him in apology — he had not realised his mother had kept the plan from his father — and mentions in passing he has *had an episode.* Nothing urgent; tomorrow. Dalinar looks back at Wit leaning impossibly across the map table, *cold, emotionless, eyes deep voids.* Dalinar turns the night's lesson over: Jasnah and Wit manoeuvred Ruthar into every wrong move he could make. *Could I do something similar in facing Odium?* How does one intimidate a god? He decides to take that question to Jasnah and Wit — though not today. Today he has had enough of their machinations.