They didn’t understand. Nobody survived a hundred bridge runs. Kaladin had been on two dozen, and he was already one of the most experienced living bridgemen.
Bridge Four followed him. The last of the holdouts – a thin man named Bisig – had given in yesterday. Kaladin preferred to think that the laughter, the food, and the humanity had finally gotten to him. But it had probably been a few glares or under-the-breath threats from Rock and Teft.
Kaladin turned a blind eye to those. He’d eventually need the men’s loyalty, but for now, he’d settle for obedience.
He guided them through the morning exercises he’d learned his very first day in the military. Stretches followed by jumping motions. Carpenters in brown work overalls and tan or green caps passed on their way to the lumberyard, shaking their heads in amusement. Soldiers on the short ridge above, where the camp proper began, looked down and laughed. Gaz watched from beside a nearby barrack, arms folded, single eye dissatisfied.
Kaladin wiped his brow. He met Gaz’s eye for a long moment, then turned back to the men. There was still time to practice hauling the bridge before breakfast.
Gaz had never gotten used to having just one eye. Could a man get used to that? He’d rather have lost a hand or a leg than that eye. He couldn’t stop feeling that something hid in that darkness he couldn’t see, but others could. What lurked there? Spren that would drain his soul from his body? The way a rat could empty an entire wineskin by chewing the corner?
His companions called him lucky. “That blow could have taken your life.” Well, at least then he wouldn’t have had to live with that darkness. One of his eyes was always closed. Close the other, and the darkness swallowed him.
Gaz glanced left, and the darkness scuttled to the side. Lamaril stood leaning against a post, tall and slim. He was not a massive man, but he was not weak. He was all lines. Rectangular beard. Rectangular body. Sharp. Like a knife.
Lamaril waved Gaz over, so he reluctantly approached. Then he took a sphere out of his pouch and passed it over. A topaz mark. He hated losing it. He always hated losing money.
“You owe me twice as much as this,” Lamaril noted, raising the sphere up to look through it as it sparkled in the sunlight.
“Well, that’s all you’ll get for now. Be glad you get anything.”
“Be glad I’ve kept my mouth shut,” Lamaril said lazily, leaning back against his post. It was one that marked the edge of the lumberyard.
Gaz gritted his teeth. He hated to pay, but what else could he do? Storms take him. Raging storms take him!
“You have a problem, it seems,” Lamaril said.
At first, Gaz thought he meant the half payment. The lighteyed man nodded toward Bridge Four’s barracks.
Gaz eyed the bridgemen, unsettled. The youthful bridgeleader barked an order, and the bridgemen raced the span of the lumberyard in a jog. He already had them running in time with one another. That one change meant so much. It sped them up, helped them think like a team.
Could this boy actually have military training, as he’d once claimed? Why would he be wasted as a bridgeman? Of course, there was that shash brand on his forehead…
“I don’t see a problem,” Gaz said with a grunt. “They’re fast. That’s good.”
“They’re insubordinate.”
“They follow orders.”
“His orders, perhaps.” Lamaril shook his head. “Bridgemen exist for one purpose, Gaz. To protect the lives of more valuable men.”
“Really? And here I thought their purpose was to carry bridges.”
Lamaril gave him a sharp look. He leaned forward. “Don’t try me, Gaz. And don’t forget your place. Would you like to join them?”
Gaz felt a spike of fear. Lamaril was a very lowly lighteyes, one of the landless. But he was Gaz’s immediate superior, a liaison between bridge crews and the higher-ranked lighteyes who oversaw the lumberyard.
Gaz looked down at the ground. “I’m sorry, Brightlord.”
“Highprince Sadeas holds an edge,” Lamaril said, leaning back against his post. “He maintains it by pushing us all. Hard. Each man in his place.” He nodded toward the members of Bridge Four. “Speed is not a bad thing. Initiative is not a bad thing. But men with initiative like that boy’s are not often happy in their position. The bridge crews function as they are, without need for modification. Change can be unsettling.”
Gaz doubted that any of the bridgemen really understood their place in Sadeas’s plans. If they knew why they were worked as pitilessly as they were – and why they were forbidden shields or armor – they likely would just cast themselves into the chasm. Bait. They were bait. Draw the Parshendi attention, let the savages think they were doing some good by felling a few bridges’ worth of bridgemen every assault. So long as you took plenty of men, that didn’t matter. Except to those who were slaughtered.
Stormfather, Gaz thought, I hate myself for being a part of this. But he’d hated himself for a long time now. It wasn’t anything new to him. “I’ll do something,” he promised Lamaril. “A knife in the night. Poison in the food.” That twisted his insides. The boy’s bribes were small, but they were all that let him keep ahead of his payments to Lamaril.
“No!” Lamaril hissed. “You want it seen that he was really a threat? The real soldiers are already talking about him.” Lamaril grimaced. “The last thing we need is a martyr inspiring rebellion among the bridgemen. I don’t want any hint of it; nothing our highprince’s enemies could take advantage of.” Lamaril glanced at Kaladin, jogging past again with his men. “That one has to fall on the field, as he deserves. Make certain it happens. And get me the rest of the money you owe, or you’ll soon find yourself carrying one of those bridges yourself.”
He swept away, forest-green cloak fluttering. In his time as a soldier, Gaz had learned to fear the minor lighteyes the most. They were galled by their closeness in rank to the darkeyes, yet those darkeyes were the only ones they had any authority over. That made them dangerous. Being around a man like Lamaril was like handling a hot coal with bare fingers. There was no way to avoid burning yourself. You just hoped to be quick enough to keep the burns to a minimum.
Bridge Four ran by. A month ago, Gaz wouldn’t have believed this possible. A group of bridgemen, practicing? And all it seemed to have cost Kaladin was a few bribes of food and some empty promises that he would protect them.
That shouldn’t have been enough. Life as a bridgeman was hopeless. Gaz couldn’t join them. He just couldn’t. Kaladin the lordling had to fall. But if Kaladin’s spheres vanished, Gaz could just as easily end up as a bridgeman for failing to pay Lamaril. Storming Damnation! he thought. It was like trying to choose which claw of the chasmfiend would crush you.
Gaz continued to watch Kaladin’s crew. And still that darkness waited for him. Like an itch that couldn’t be scratched. Like a scream that couldn’t be silenced. A tingling numbness that he could never be rid of.
It would probably follow him even into death.
“Bridge up!” Kaladin bellowed, running with Bridge Four. They raised the bridge over their heads while still moving. It was harder to run this way, holding the bridge up, rather than resting it on the shoulders. He felt its enormous weight on his arms.
“Down!” he ordered.
Those at the front let go of the bridge and ran out to the sides. The others lowered the bridge in a quick motion. It hit the ground awkwardly, scraping the stone. They got into position, pretending to move it across a chasm. Kaladin helped at the side.