Warbreaker (Warbreaker #1)(161)

“Good enough.”

She hesitated. “Do you really think we can do it. Stop the war?”

He shrugged. “Maybe. Assuming I can keep myself from beating the Colors out of all these Idrians for acting like idiots.”

A pacifist with temper-control issues, she thought ruefully. What a combination. A little like a devout Idrian princess who holds enough BioChromatic Breath to populate a small village.

“There are more places like this,” Vasher said. “I would show you to the people there.”

“All right,” she said, trying not to look at the blade as she stood. Even now, it had a strange ability to make her feel sick.

Vasher nodded. “There won’t be many people at each meeting. I don’t have Denth’s connections, and I’m not friendly with important people. The ones I know are workers. We’ll have to go visit the dye vats, perhaps even some of the fields.”

“I understand,” she said.

Without further comment, Vasher picked up his bag of coins, then led her out onto the street. And so, she thought, I begin again.

I can only hope that this time, I’m on the right side.

44

Siri watched Susebron with affection as he ate a third dessert. Their night’s meal lay spread out on the table and floor, some dishes completely devoured, others barely tasted. That first night when Susebron had ordered a meal had started a tradition. Now they ordered food every night—though only after Siri did her act for the listening priests. Susebron claimed to find it very amusing, though she noticed the curiosity in his eyes as he watched her.

Susebron had proven to have quite a sweet tooth now that disapproving priests and their sense of etiquette were absent. “You should probably watch out,” she noted as he finished another pastry. “If you eat too many of those, you will get fat.”

He reached for his writing board. No I won’t.

“Yes you will,” she said, smiling. “That’s the way it works.”

Not for gods, he wrote. My mother explained it. Some men become more bulky if they exercise a lot and become fat if they eat a lot. That doesn’t happen to Returned. We always look the same.



Siri couldn’t offer argument. What did she know of Returned?

Is food in Idris like this? Susebron wrote.

Siri smiled. He was always so curious about her homeland. She could sense a longing in him, the wish to be free of his palace and see the outside. And yet, he didn’t want to be disobedient, even when the rules were harsh.

“I really need to work on corrupting you some more,” she noted.

He paused. What does that have to do with food?

“Nothing,” she said. “But it’s true nonetheless. You’re far too good a person, Susebron.”

Sarcasm? he wrote. I certainly hope that it is.

“Only half,” she said, lying down on her stomach and watching him across their impromptu picnic setting.

Half-sarcasm? he wrote. Is this something new?

“No,” she said, sighing. “There is truth sometimes even in sarcasm. I don’t really want to corrupt you, but I do think that you’re just too perfectly obedient. You need to be a little more reckless. Impulsive and in de pen dent.”

It’s hard to be impulsive when you are locked in a palace surrounded by hundreds of servants, he wrote.

“Good point.”

However, I have been thinking about the things you’ve said. Please don’t be mad at me.

Siri perked up, noting the embarrassment in his expression. “All right. What did you do?”

I talked to my priests, he said. With the artisans’ script.

Siri felt a moment of panic. “You told them about us?”

No, no, he wrote quickly. I did tell them I was worried about having a child. I asked why my father died right after he had a child.

Siri frowned. Part of her wished that he’d let her handle such negotiations. However, she said nothing. She didn’t want to keep him pinned down as his priests did. It was his life that was being threatened—he deserved the chance to work on the problem too.

“Good,” she said.

You’re not mad?

She shrugged. “I was just encouraging you to be more impulsive! I can’t complain now. What did they say?”

He erased, then continued. They told me not to worry. They said everything would be all right. So I asked them again, and again they gave me a vague answer.

Siri nodded slowly.

It hurts me to write this, but I’m beginning to think that you are right. I’ve noticed that my guards and Awakeners are staying particularly close lately. We even skipped going to the Court Assembly yesterday.

“That’s a bad sign,” she agreed. “I haven’t had much luck finding out what is going to happen. I’ve ordered in three other storytellers but none of them had any better information than what Hoid gave me.”

You still think it’s about the Breath I hold?

She nodded. “Remember what I said about my conversation with Treledees? He talked about that Breath of yours with reverence. To him, it’s something to be passed from generation to generation, like a family tapestry.”

In one of the children’s stories in my book, he wrote, there is a magic sword. A young boy is given it by his grandfather, and it turns out the sword was a heirloom—the symbol of kingship in the land.