The Way of Kings

It took time for them to reply. Poorly, Eylita finally sent. Your father’s debts are coming due, and Wikim can barely keep the creditors distracted. The highprince ails, and everyone wants to know where our house stands on the question of succession. The last of the quarries is running out. If it becomes known that we no longer have resources, it will go badly for us.

Shallan grimaced. How long do I have?

A few more months, at best, Nan Balat sent back via his betrothed. It depends on how long the highprince lasts and whether or not anyone realizes why Asha Jushu is selling our possessions. Jushu was the youngest of the brothers, just older than Shallan. His old gambling habit was actually coming in handy. For years, he’d been stealing things from their father and selling them to cover his losses. He pretended he was still doing that, but he brought the money back to help. He was a good man, despite his habit. And, all things considered, he really couldn’t be blamed for much of what he’d done. None of them could.

Wikim thinks that he can keep everyone at bay for a while longer. But we are getting desperate. The sooner you return with the Soulcaster, the better.

Shallan hesitated, then wrote, Are we certain this is the best way? Perhaps we should simply ask Jasnah for help.

You think she would respond to that? they wrote back. She would help an unknown and disliked Veden house? She would keep our secrets?

Probably not. Though Shallan was increasingly certain that Jasnah’s reputation was exaggerated, the woman did have a ruthless side to her. She would not leave her important studies to go help Shallan’s family.

She reached for the reed to reply, but it started scribbling again. Shallan, it said. This is Nan Balat; I have sent the others away. It is only Eylita and me writing you now. There is something you need to know. Luesh is dead.

Shallan blinked in surprise. Luesh, her father’s steward, had been the one who had known how to use the Soulcaster. He was one of the few people she and her brothers had determined they could trust.

What happened? she wrote after switching to a new sheet of paper.

He died in his sleep, and there’s no reason to suspect he was killed. But Shallan, a few weeks after his passing, some men visited here claiming to be friends of our father. In private with me, they implied they knew of Father’s Soulcaster and suggested strongly that I was to return it to them.

Shallan frowned. She still carried her father’s broken Soulcaster in the safepouch of her sleeve. Return it? she wrote.

We never did figure out where Father got it, Nan Balat sent. Shallan, he was involved in something. Those maps, the things Luesh said, and now this. We continue to pretend that Father is alive, and occasionally he gets letters from other lighteyes that speak of vague “plans.” I think he was going to make a play to become highprince. And he was supported by some very powerful forces.