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“What if I could provide you with another option that didn’t involve murdering any more people?”
“We tried,” Nikli said. “We did everything we could to frighten you away.” His skin split along the seams, as if in agitation. “The storm has protected this place for centuries. It is only recently that it weakened enough to let people through. But . . . we are committed, Rysn. By now we’ve killed hundreds.”
“And you’ve never wondered whether your method is flawed? Yes, you could create another fabrication. But will it work? Or will more of the truth seep out? Will you end up with people swarming this island? Coming ever closer to the real secrets? The ones you hide in these caves?
“You say you wish to protect life. But if you continue on your current course, you’re going to have to kill Cord and me. You are going to kill Knights Radiant. If you truly are sorry you have to take such desperate actions, don’t you owe it to yourself—and the cosmere—to sit and at least see if there is another way?”
She turned her hands up, again signaling her desire to begin a deal.
Nikli glanced at his two companions. One barely made an effort to appear human; her skin split at wide seams, and cremlings crawled up and down her body. Neither gave a response Rysn could understand, though the unnerving buzzing surrounding them grew louder.
Finally, Nikli stepped forward and—to Rysn’s immense relief—sat at the table.
Lopen managed—barely—to roll out of the way of the arm that speared down at him. But his foot screamed in pain and flopped awkwardly on the end of his leg, causing him to see stars and blink away tears. So many painspren crawled around him that he could have started a storming parade.
“Please, gods of the ancient Herdazians,” Lopen whispered. “Don’t let me get killed by a monster that looks so stupid. Please.”
The sailors shouted, throwing spears that bounced off the creature, trying to distract it from him. Lopen attempted to push himself up onto one leg to maybe hop away, but it was way too painful. He could barely crawl. And storms, he didn’t know any one-legged Herdazian jokes.
He flopped to the stones as the thing roared and turned fully toward him. Somehow it knew that a Radiant was a better feast than those sailors. Either that or it was captivated by Lopen’s majesty. His lying-on-the-ground-crying-his-eyes-out-all-bloody majesty. So maybe not.
Rua tried to urge Lopen on by taking the shape of an axehound. He bounced around, worried. Huio dropped out of the sky directly in front of Lopen, spear in hand, but his glow faded. Had the things drained him too, or had he run out normally?
Lopen waved for him to go, to run for it with the sailors. But he stayed firm. Stupid chull-brain—he stepped squarely between the monster and Lopen. As it reared to swing, Huio looked right at Lopen, then turned toward the oncoming spear-leg and set himself.
“Huio!” Lopen cried.
His cousin exploded with light. A blast of something frigid washed over Lopen, and he found himself disturbing a large frost pattern on the ground in the shape of a glyph.
As the creature’s arm reached Huio, mist appeared in the man’s hand—forming the biggest, most awesome Shardhammer Lopen had ever seen. Huio slammed it with all his might against the monster’s arm, and the carapace cracked and split, spraying violet goo across the stones.
Nikli winced.
“What?” Rysn asked.
“Your friends fight very well,” he said.
“They’re still alive? You haven’t killed them?”
“We have the captain and the crew on the ship held captive,” Nikli said. “I persuaded the others to wait to put them down until I’d spoken to you.” He held out his hands. “How does this usually proceed?”
“I am the one initiating the trade,” Rysn said. “So it is upon me to make an offer.”
“You have nothing that we want.”
“You want to find a way to avoid killing,” Rysn said, keeping her voice steady. “I can help you.”
“Wrong,” Nikli said. “We wish to avoid losing control of a force that could destroy the cosmere. That is what we want, though we do desire to accomplish it with as little suffering as is reasonable.”
“Then I can help you,” Rysn said. “You want to create a fabrication that others will believe? I will be far better at that than you would be. Both Queen Navani and the Thaylen council will respond better to me telling them that Akinah was a trap than they would to someone like you.”
“Except that requires me to trust you with a secret too dangerous to let escape,” Nikli said. “Besides, the crew that remains on the ship saw my kind. The sailors will have to die, even if we come up with an accommodation between us.”
“No,” Rysn said.
“You have no position from which to—”
“I will not give up the lives of the captain or any of my crew. That is not negotiable. They are my responsibility.”
Nikli lifted his hands to the sides as if to say, “I told you there was no accommodation to be made.” It was unnerving how—in the gesture—each of his fingers came free a little, revealing the insectile legs beneath.
Rysn couldn’t help staring. “What . . . what are you?” she found herself whispering, though she probably should have stayed on task.
“I am like you,” Nikli said. “Your body is made up of tiny individual pieces called cells. My body is made up of pieces as well.”
“Cremlings,” she said.
“As I and my kind are not native to this planet, we prefer the term ‘hordelings.’ ”
“And one of them is your brain?” she asked.
“Many of them. We store memories in specialized hordelings bred for the purpose. Cognitive facilities are shared across many different members of the swarm.”
He waved his fingers, and again the different little cremlings—no, hordelings—separated. “It took my people three hundred years of selective breeding to achieve hordelings capable of imitating human fingers. And still, most of us are terrible at pretending to be humans. We don’t have the mannerisms, the thoughts.
“I’m younger than the others, but am more . . . skilled at using these things.” He regarded her. “I have come to understand humans a little, Rysn. I like talking to you, being with you. Though I love your kind, even I am persuaded as to what must be done. Our impasse cannot be resolved.”
“No,” Rysn said. “There is a way.” She forcibly made herself use the careful, reasonable tone her babsk had drilled into her. “You say that the sailors have seen you—this can work to our advantage. The best fabrications are mostly true, and having many witnesses corroborate what I say will help.”
Nikli shook his head. “Rysn, there are forces in the cosmere that we can barely identify, let alone track. Evil forces, who would end worlds if they could. They are hunting this place. Now that the Ancient Guardians of Akinah are all but extinct, we Sleepless must protect it. For if our enemies locate it, they could cause the deaths of billions.” He waved toward the mural. “The Dawnshard is . . .”
He stopped. Then he squinted. Then he leaped to his feet. Winged hordelings crawled out of his skull and flew through the air to land on the mural. They scrambled across it, and were joined by hordelings sent by the other two.
