Child of Tanavast
POV: dalinar
Summary
In the next highstorm vision Dalinar is some kind of Radiant-era farmer, kneeling beside a child in a field at sunset while a robed figure with a Bridge across his cloak addresses the child by an ancient and unfamiliar title — *Child of Tanavast* — the old, half-forgotten name for the Almighty before the Heralds' age. The robed figure speaks of a coming Desolation and of the duty owed to it. The vision is brief and structured the way the others have begun to be: study what was; listen for what is asked; act with honor.
When the storm passes and Dalinar returns to the dark of the top room, he sits up slowly and decides — for the first time — not to write the vision down for anyone. He has not spoken honestly with Adolin since the Gallery of Maps argument, and he is not going to mend it by handing his son one more vision to disbelieve. The decision to abdicate is still a few days away in his head. The vision changes nothing about it.
Afterwards he goes out into the warcamps under the clear cold sky that always follows a storm and keeps doing what the voice told him to do. He approaches two of the less powerful highprinces in quiet meetings about a joint plateau assault on the Tower — *unite them* — and lets them know obliquely that Roion is already discussing it. He keeps to the Codes in every public gesture. He waits for Sadeas to move his investigation forward, because Sadeas will, and there is nothing to be done about it but be ready. The visions, he decides, can be his alone for now. The work they ask of him cannot.