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The chasmfiend hauls itself onto the viewing plateau and begins smashing through the unarmed attendants. Dalinar runs after the king counting ten heartbeats for his Blade — Oathbringer mists into his hand as he reaches the beast. Elhokar summons Sunraiser and shouts to make the beast angry. Adolin gallops up on Sureblood — the only horse not panicked — and the two Kholin Shardbearers begin to shear legs out from under the fourteen-legged greatshell while Sadeas hangs back loosing his grandbow.

The fight nearly turns. A claw catches Adolin from behind and throws him; his Shardplate breastplate cracks and leaks Stormlight, and he lies dazed. A second claw knocks Elhokar off his feet, his Blade vanishes, and the chasmfiend lifts a claw to crush him. Dalinar's reservations vanish — he will not fail another brother's family — and he drops Oathbringer, skids beneath the falling claw, and **catches it bare-gauntleted**, bowed on one knee. Plate cracks across his shoulders and gauntlets in webs of light; he bellows back at the trumpeting beast and holds. Adolin, shaking off his daze, sees the Blackthorn for the first time. He scrambles to his feet, summons his Blade, and shears the leg nearest him. The right-side legs snap under the beast's own weight; it topples sideways in a spray of violet ichor.

Dalinar tosses the limp claw aside and nods Elhokar toward the throat. The king summons Sunraiser again and stops the heart; the chasmfiend's uniform green eyes blacken and shrivel into smoke. Once the beast is dead a Blade will cut flesh normally — Elhokar plunges his Blade into its chest, reaches into the wound, and rips out a head-sized lumpy emerald gemheart, the largest Adolin has ever seen. Gloryspren bloom golden around the king and the soldiers shout in triumph over the cooling carcass.