Up close, it was hard to see people that way. Each was so distinctive. Everyone should use a “the” in front of their name. He’d merely figured that out first.
Rua, his spren, darted out of a side corridor ahead, then spun around in a loop, excited. Looked like he’d found the Reshi people Lopen was supposed to meet with today. Great! Lopen increased his speed with a Lashing, soaring a couple feet over the heads of the people in the corridor. Some of them cringed with startled expressions. He was doing them a favor, sure, because they should be used to Windrunners flying overhead. What did they expect him to do? Walk?
Rua transformed into one of his favorite shapes—a flying chull with broad wings—and zoomed alongside Lopen. At the next intersection, Rua led him left. They emerged into the atrium: a big open section that seemed to have no roof, just tens upon tens of levels with balconies and a large window.
Here, Lopen finally found his Reshi visitors. Storms! How’d they gotten so far inside in such a short time? “Nice work, naco,” he said to Rua, then Lashed himself downward so he landed near the visitors.
He strode toward them, hands out. “Greetings! And I am the Lopen, Windrunner, poet, and your most humble servant. You must be King Ral-na!”
He’d been warned the king would be the one in the robes. He was a short man with greying hair, though his robes parted down the front to show firm pectoral muscles. He was attended by a group of fierce men in wraps, carrying spears.
“I speak for the king,” one of them said in pretty good Alethi. The tall figure wore his hair in two long braids. “You may call me Talik.”
“Sure, Talik!” Lopen said. “Do you like to fly?”
“I wouldn’t be able to say,” Talik replied. “Were you the one who was supposed to—”
“We can talk,” Lopen said, “later.” He grabbed Talik by the arm, infused him, waved to the others, then launched the two of them high into the air.
They shot up along the window, passing story after story. Lopen hung on tight. This Talik fellow was an important official, and it wouldn’t do to drop him or something. He was surrounded by shockspren in the shape of pale yellow triangles. So he seemed to be enjoying the ride.
“Now see, I figure that you live on a giant crab out in the ocean, right?” Lopen said as they flew. “One of the really big ones. A bigger-than-a-town type crab.
“I had a cousin once, sure, who had a crab he swore had bred with chulls, but I didn’t think that was possible, even if it came up to my knees. So it was a big storming crab. But we couldn’t build a house on its back. That’s wild, velo. You deserve respect for living on a giant crab. Who lives on a crab? No regular people. Just people like you.”
Lopen slowed them near the top, where the atrium finally ended, maybe a thousand feet in the air or more. It provided the best view out the window: an amazing field of snow-tipped mountains. Lopen could appreciate, from up here, how they all looked the same. One shouldn’t forget that they weren’t, sure, but there was a perspective from a distance—different from the up-close perspective.
Up close, differences could chafe. But if you remembered that from far away you all looked the same . . . well, that was important too.
“What is this?” Talik demanded. “Are you trying to intimidate me?”
“Intimidate?” Lopen said, then glanced to Rua, who grew six arms and used all of them to smack his forehead at the stupidity of that idea. “Velo,” Lopen said to Talik, “you live up high on a giant crab. I figured you’d like heights.”
“They don’t frighten me,” Talik said, folding his arms.
“Yeah, good. See, look. The view is great, right? Something you’ve never seen, right? I know about the Reshi Sea—my cousin, he lived out on the coast, and I’ve heard him say how hot it is there. No snow.”
Talik regarded him as they both hung in the air. Then the man turned and peered out the window, inspecting the beautiful field of mountains. “That . . . is rather spectacular.”
“See?” Lopen said. “I told Kaladin, ‘I’m gonna fly those Reshi guys up high.’ And Kaladin said, ‘I don’t think that’s a good—’ but I didn’t let him finish, because he was going to grumble, so I said, ‘No, I got this, gancho. They’re gonna love it.’ And you love it.”
“I . . . don’t know what to make of you,” Talik admitted.
“Nah, velo, you do. I’m the Lopen.” He pointed at himself. Rua appeared to Talik and gestured with the six arms, then grew two more for effect. “So what do you think? Should I fly your king up here? I was a king for, sure, only a couple of hours. So I don’t really know what kings like.”
“You . . . were a king?”
“For two hours,” Lopen said. “It’s a long story. But my arm was newly regrown then, so for a while that arm had only been a king. Never not a king. Wild, eh?”
Talik looked down, then waggled his feet. “How long . . .”
“Oh, you’re safe,” Lopen said. “If you drop, it would take way long for you to hit. I’d catch you first.”
“That’s not terribly encouraging . . .” Talik said. He took a deep breath, then studied Lopen. “Normally, I would assume a person who brought me up here like this had done so to discomfort me during our negotiations. But you . . . really aren’t doing that, are you?”
“We can go down if you want,” Lopen said. “I just thought . . . I mean, you like it, right?”
“I do,” Talik said, then smiled. “I will admit to finding myself . . . encouraged by the presence of a Herdazian among the Knights Radiant. I lived among your people for several years, Windrunner. Let me ask you this. In your opinion, do they truly care about us? The Alethi, the Vedens, the Azish? For centuries, they’ve ignored us in the Isles. Now, amid a war, they write to us? They ask for a meeting with our king?
“We are a proud people, the Lopen—but small, insignificant. Paid attention to by outsiders for our novelty, or for the ways we can be exploited. I trained in Thaylenah. I know how we’re regarded. And I know they have historically treated you the same way. So can you tell me why the greatest kings in Roshar would suddenly show interest in us?”
“Oh, that,” Lopen said. “Yeah, they think maybe the enemy will start moving troops through the sea to land for an invasion of Jah Keved in the east. So, Dalinar and Jasnah figure it would be good to have you on their side.”
“So it’s purely political,” Talik said.
“Purely?” Lopen shrugged, and Rua did too. “They’re trying to be good, velo. But they’re, you know, Alethi. Conquering folks is basically their primary cultural heritage. It’s taking some time for them to learn to see things another way—but they are listening. They agreed to let me talk to you, after I explained we were practically cousins, what with the Reshi Isles being so close to Herdaz.”
Talik nodded.
“I was one of the ones that told them to send to you,” Lopen said. “See, lots of us people—Herdaz, Reshi, even Thaylenah to an extent—are small. But the whole world has been invaded, not only the big places. And a lot of small people make big numbers, velo. That’s why I wanted to talk to you first, to ask you to listen to what the Alethi say.”