The Way of Kings

“Oh, I don’t know about that,” Tien said, still smiling. “It’s just a horse. Master Ral likes things you can use. Things to sit on, things to put clothes in. But I think I can make a good chair tomorrow, something that will make him proud.”

Kaladin looked at his brother, with his innocent face and affable nature. He hadn’t lost either, though he was now into his teenage years. How is it you can always smile? Kaladin thought. It’s dreadful outside, your master treats you like crem, and your family is slowly being strangled by the citylord. And yet you smile. How, Tien?

And why is it that you make me want to smile too?

“Father spent another of the spheres, Tien,” Kaladin found himself saying. Each time their father was forced to do that, he seemed to grow a little more wan, stand a little less tall. Those spheres were dun these days, no light in them. You couldn’t infuse spheres during the Weeping. They all ran out, eventually.

“There are plenty more,” Tien said.

“Roshone is trying to wear us down,” Kaladin said. “Bit by bit, smother us.”

“It’s not as bad as it seems, Kaladin,” his brother said, reaching up to hold his arm. “Things are never as bad as they seem. You’ll see.”

So many objections rose in his mind, but Tien’s smile banished them. There, in the midst of the dreariest part of the year, Kaladin felt for a moment as if he had glimpsed sunshine. He could swear he felt things grow brighter around them, the storm retreating a shade, the sky lightening.

Their mother rounded the back of the building. She looked up at them, as if amused to find them both sitting on the roof in the rain. She stepped onto the lower portion. A small group of haspers clung to the stone there; the small two-shelled creatures proliferated during the Weeping. They seemed to grow out of nowhere, much like their cousins the tiny snails, scattered all across the stone.

“What are you two talking about?” she asked, walking up and sitting down with them. Hesina rarely acted like the other mothers in town. Sometimes, that bothered Kaladin. Shouldn’t she have sent them into the house or something, complaining that they’d catch a cold? No, she just sat down with them, wearing a brown leather raincoat.

“Kaladin’s worried about Father spending the spheres,” Tien said.

“Oh, I wouldn’t worry about that,” she replied. “We’ll get you to Kharbranth. You’ll be old enough to leave in two more months.”

“You two should come with me,” Kal said. “And Father too.”

“And leave the town?” Tien said, as if he’d never considered that possibility. “But I like it here.”

Hesina smiled.

“What?” Kaladin said.

“Most young men your age are trying everything they can to be rid of their parents.”

“I can’t go off and leave you here. We’re a family.”

“He’s trying to strangle us,” Kaladin said, glancing at Tien. Talking with his brother had made him feel a lot better, but his objections were still there. “Nobody pays for healing, and I know nobody will pay you for work anymore. What kind of value does Father get for those spheres he spends anyway? Vegetables at ten times the regular price, moldy grain at double?”

Hesina smiled. “Observant.”

“Father taught me to notice details. The eyes of a surgeon.”

“Well,” she said, eyes twinkling, “did your surgeon’s eyes notice the first time we spent one of the spheres?”

“Sure,” Kaladin said. “It was the day after the hunting accident. Father had to buy new cloth to make bandages.”

“And did we need new bandages?”

“Well, no. But you know how Father is. He doesn’t like it when we start to run even a little low.”

“And so he spent one of those spheres,” Hesina said. “That he’d hoarded for months and months, butting heads with the citylord over them.”

Not to mention going to such lengths to steal them in the first place, Kaladin thought. But you know all about that. He glanced at Tien, who was watching the sky again. So far as Kal knew, his brother hadn’t discovered the truth yet.

“So your father resisted so long,” Hesina said, “only to finally break and spend a sphere on some cloth bandages we wouldn’t need for months.”

She had a point. Why had his father suddenly decided to… “He’s letting Roshone think he’s winning,” Kaladin said with surprise, looking back at her.

Hesina smiled slyly. “Roshone would have found a way to get retribution eventually. It wouldn’t have been easy. Your father ranks high as a citizen, and has the right of inquest. He did save Roshone’s life, and many could testify to the severity of Rillir’s wounds. But Roshone would have found a way. Unless he felt he’d broken us.”