POV: kaladin
Summary
Kaladin, in the Kholin gaol, fends off the dark by planning: what he will do when he is out, when, not if. His mind whispers lies — that Dalinar secretly wants him in there, that Bridge Four is glad to be rid of him. A key turns. He comes up off the bench with his empty bowl raised to throw before he realizes that the jailer has come with a pardon from the king, his rank and post untouched. Kaladin walks out wary, breathes a leeward window of cool air, and tells himself: nobody will ever do this to him again. He would die first.
The jailer leads him to a larger cell down the hall and lets Adolin out. The prince looks better than Kaladin feels — has had baths, even if cold — and is wearing cologne. The jailer mutters that the prince walked in on the first day of Kaladin's sentence and refused to come out; nobody could make a man of his rank leave. Adolin says only that it did not seem right, and besides, Kaladin saved Renarin. He has been thinking about Amaram too, and decides that a man whose reputation is too clean usually has something to hide; he believes everything Kaladin said in the arena, even if he agrees with his father that the way Kaladin said it was politically idiotic.
Beyond the next door, most of Bridge Four is crammed into the jailers' break room with a table shoved aside. They salute, the salutes dissolve into cheering, and the dark in Kaladin's head finally goes quiet. Rock cracks on his beard, Renarin — in Bridge Four colours — settles in beside his brother, and Adolin's armorers stand against the wall with bundles under sheets. Adolin claps the room quiet and announces that he is now in possession of two new Shardblades and three sets of Plate — the Kholin princedom now holding a quarter of all the Shards in Alethkar — that he has been named dueling champion, that Relis is already on a caravan home, and that one full set of Blade and orange Plate is for Kaladin. The bridgemen wait to see if a darkeyes' eyes change colour when he bonds a Shard.
Kaladin feels sick. He asks if the Shards are truly his to do with as he wishes, and when Adolin confirms it, he points at Moash and says: take these, you are now a Shardbearer. Adolin hauls him back into the hallway and hisses that this is the dream of every soldier, that as a Shardbearer he could legally challenge Amaram, that the assassin will return and they will need every Blade they can field. Kaladin tells him quietly that those Blades have killed people he loved and he cannot touch one without seeing blood, that he does not want his life to change because he became lighteyed but the lives of darkeyes like himself to change, and that they would do better having three of them — one Sharded — to face the assassin together than two. Reluctantly, Adolin yields.
Moash takes the Blade — a double-edged silver weapon with a vine pattern up the centre and a heliodor in the pommel — and gloryspren spin around him. The armorers fit on his orange Plate (which he insists he will not take off until he can move in it). Outside, soldiers and bridgemen from other crews cheer; Teft reports that the men talked about breaking Kaladin out and that he beat the idea out of them, and that the camp is buzzing with talk of Amaram. Dalinar watches from a distance, pensive.
Kaladin sends the others ahead and lingers to help Moash with the rest of his armor. In the quiet of the front room he tells Moash that prison gave him time to think — and that Moash's friends are right. Moash grips his arm: he told them Kaladin would see. He gestures at the Plate — it will speed the work, and once it is done Moash hints the same fate may await Amaram. Kaladin tells him to be honest that for him it is revenge, but says he believes it is what Alethkar — perhaps the world — needs. Moash puts on the helm, takes a step, stumbles, and laughs as he splinters a table beneath one gauntlet. Kaladin leaves him heading for the sparring grounds and steps out into the sun toward Rock's celebratory stew.