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Dalinar is not asleep. He stands on the balcony of his Urithiru quarters in the small hours of the night, feeling alone — never truly alone, with the Stormfather now a persistent quiet voice in his head, and yet alone all the same. Eight days remain before he must face Odium. He turns over the old, useless thought that Gavilar would have planned this better, that perhaps the wrong brother had died that night. Then he goes inside to the room Navani has reshaped to his preference: spare, decorated only where she insists, his grandfather's takama mounted between two banners on the wall with its belt wound twice around it. He recognises the tension in his shoulders for what it is — the old soldier's sense of a line about to break — and the knock arrives a moment later. Pabolon is already at the door when he gets there. On the threshold stands a wide-eyed Windrunner squire, Stormlight venting off her like steam.

Jasnah is not asleep either. She lies in a too-soft mattress procured for Wit's comfort and itemises the cost of the relationship — his small, patient lies, the wordplay he promised to stop and merely refined, the nights when he leaves her sleeping body to walk in other worlds. She has caught herself worrying about a man eight days before her uncle confronts the oldest foe of their species, and indicts herself for the distraction. Wit sits up cursing in the dark, then bursts into a flurry of activity at her counter, scribbling in a script not of Roshar while every metal object in the room shudders toward him and his strange iridescent sand lifts into the air. For a few seconds his body itself molds into another shape — shorter, white-haired, subtly other — before snapping back. He tells her he has been tricked. A review of the memories he keeps externally in Breath has surfaced just under three and a half minutes excised from a conversation he had with Odium the day prior, sloppily enough that the seams remain. The forgery is itself the evidence: Rayse used to need the gloating, and this time chose to let Wit walk away thinking he had won. He demands they reread the contract immediately. A Cobalt Guard called Hendit arrives at the door with worse news — armies are crossing Shadesmar toward Azimir with the Oathgate poised to admit them; her uncle has summoned the council at the day's first bell.

Navani is not asleep. The Sibling bond has wired her into the workings of Urithiru — the pumps fetching water through stone, the heating fabrials, the lifts in constant motion, the Towerlight that makes a Radiant standing inside the city almost untouchable. She has walked a tunnel that was sealed until her bonding into a chamber set with hundreds of archaic ventilation fabrials, lifespren orbiting her like a cloak. The Sibling tells her she will not sleep tonight, or any night while she holds the bond: she is part of the tower and the tower does not sleep. Navani notes the price already — a few weeks away from Urithiru is the most she can risk before the bond weakens — and tries to keep the trade in perspective. A solitary keenspren manifests above her, the first she has ever seen. The Sibling explains that the tower hears anything spoken inside its walls; they argue, briefly, about whether this counts as spying. Then the Sibling interrupts her with sudden urgency: she needs to hear what the Windrunner at Dalinar's door is saying.

Fen is not asleep. She and Kmakl have snuck away from their guards onto the royal yacht for one of their occasional belowdecks pretenses — old enough by either of their accountings to be embarrassed by it, comfortable enough not to be. A young lieutenant blunders down the ladder with a sphere lantern, drops it in shock at the queen's bare state, and scrambles for the diamonds while Fen enjoys his discomfort and Kmakl tries to put him out of his misery. The mood changes when the boy delivers his message: enemy armies poised against Azir, moving through Shadesmar. Then Admiral Fladrn follows down the ladder in person, takes her state of undress without missing a beat, and adds the second blow — the Thaylen cordon around Jah Keved has been shattered by the entire massed strength of the Skybreakers, half the fleet sunk, the Windrunner escort driven off, an assault force now bound directly for Thaylen City. They had braced for border skirmishes; they are looking instead at a coordinated strike at the coalition's capitals. She throws her husband his trousers and tells him it is time to discover what the coalition is willing to pay back.

Yanagawn is asleep, by imperial decree if not by fact. The schedule says he is to be asleep at this hour, and the schedule is essentially the one thing required of him: to be the office, to stand still while Azir looks at him, to lie like a clothing rack holding the imperial robes to their proper shape so passersby can be inspired. He must not toss or turn — the ten honored guests keeping bedside vigil this hour, women who fed his armies near Emul, would read it as nervousness — so any restless thought crowding his mind tonight is, by definition, only a sleeper's. He inventories the things he cannot do: own his Shards in fact rather than in title, recall those his soldiers carry under imperial grant, wield any of them himself. He asks Yaezir whether this is really all that is wanted of him. The dream is interrupted by guards apologising to the honored women, then bowing more deeply to him, and behind them Noura kneels. Whatever it is, it is real. He slips from the bed and holds his arms out so that he can be dressed. The emperor is awake.