Six years ago, the Assassin in White killed the Alethi king on the night a treaty with the Parshendi was being celebrated. The Vengeance Pact that followed has ground on ever since - a war of attrition on the Shattered Plains that has cost thousands of lives without resolution. Now the Assassin is active again, murdering rulers across the world with powers no bodyguard can counter, and Highprince Dalinar is among his prime targets. Kaladin, the former slave who survived to be given command of the royal bodyguards, must protect both Dalinar and the king while secretly struggling to master abilities linked to his honorspren Syl - abilities that could mark him as something the world hasn't seen in centuries. Shallan Davar, travelling to the Shattered Plains to train under Jasnah Kholin, carries her own burden: secrets about the legendary Voidbringers and a Desolation that may be closer than anyone believes. And at the heart of the Plains, the Parshendi themselves are making a desperate choice - one whose consequences neither side can predict. The second volume of the Stormlight Archive, where the scope widens, the stakes deepen, and the nature of the conflict on Roshar begins to reveal itself.
