Feeling the hole in her havah with her safehand, Kari looked down at herself, then at her son Gavinor, sleeping nearby. They were in Shadesmar, and Kari was having trouble processing everything that had happened.
Most of the group had passed out, the exhaustion of the day finally catching up with them. But Kari was still awake.
As was Kaladin.
Her eyes fell on the man who used to be the head of her guard, and was now one of the strongest warriors in Alethkar. Maybe on Roshar.
A man who had freezed in battle, and was clearly still out of sorts.
Walking up to stand beside him, Kari cleared her throat. She and the highmarshll hadn't spoken much since her coming out, and that particular topic hadn't been broached at all. "Kaladin." She didn't call him by his rank. She wasn't really feeling much like royalty, at the moment.
"Brightness." Kaladin wasn't scowling. But he also didn't look present.
They both stared out at the sea of glass beads, and Kari tried to think of something, anything, she could say. "Thank you. If you hadn't urged me into action, it's possible that my...that the Unmade would have stopped us from leaving, and my son would still be there."
She tried very hard not to think of what Aesudan looked like, the things she said, the truth that had been staring her in the face for so long. Oh Elhokar, what have you done to yourself? That isn't the man I married... The words, in her warm loving voice, came unbidden to Kari's mind, and she flinched.
Still not looking at her, Kaladin gave a miniscule shrug. "You're the one who saved him. You're...a good mom."
Those words sent strange flutters through Kari's chest. Gender euphoria? Now of all times? "Am I? I haven't seen him for years, and I left him with..."
"You didn't know." Kaladin's words had a little more life to them than they did before, but he still sounded numb.
It was an easy excuse. But Kari wouldn't let herself use it. "I...didn't know. But there were signs there, ones I could have read but chose not to. Jasnah even tried to warn me, but I fought with her about it."
Something about that answer made Kaladin grit his teeth. "But...shouldn't we try to have faith in those close to us?" He was invested in the conversation now, for some reason, and he wanted to make a point. Though whether to Kari or himself, she didn't know.
"Maybe?" Kari's exhaustion was evident in her voice. "I believed in Aesudan...for so long. I kept making excuses for her, and I knew that none of you agreed with me. But I kept telling myself that none of you knew her, not like I did. In the end, I was just being one of the Ten Fools."
"You love her." It wasn't a question.
Hearing it made Kari's heart ache. "...yes. I do. Aesudan..." Something stopped Kari from saying that, from going that far.
Kari's spren, Design, was attempting to mimic the sleeping humans. She hummed sharply when Kari broached that unsaid truth. Design was...strange. Kari hadn't talked to her as much as she had wanted to.
Kaladin hadn't said anything else, and still looked gloomier than usual. So Kari took a guess. "Who is it that you're wishing you hadn't trusted?"
"..." Kaladin tensed his jaw, as though forcing himself not to answer. When he did reply, it was a tight whisper. "Moash."
The Lightweaver froze. "Oh. Him." The bodyguard turned assassin, who only failed in killing Kari thanks to Kaladin's timely arrival. The human working with the Parshmen, who came close to killing Kari and Gavinor.
It almost looked like Kaladin was going to defend the traitor. But instead, his shoulders slumped. "I trained him. I got him out of the bridgecrews. I gave him the Shardblade." Kari wasn't sure what to say to that. Every word was true.
There was obviously guilt inside of him for that, but Kari still got the sense he was holding something back. "Windrunner...why did you freeze?" She did her best to ask it without any judgment. After all, Kari wasn't exactly a great warrior either.
Nothing she said got Kaladin to reply. He just...withdrew into himself. His spren, Syl, came up to put a hand on her shoulder, and gave Kari a look of gratitude.
Seemingly with no other options, Kari went and sat down next to Design, who perked up at her approach. "Hmmm?"
"This is a disaster." An understatement, but true nonetheless. "If I hadn't delayed us for so long, if we'd gone in earlier, maybe we could have..."
"Could have what?" Design asked, clearly curious. "Would we have been able to use the Oathgate, without the Unmade sending us here?" Design reminded Kari of some of her mother's scholars, always full of questions.
"Well, if we'd caught them earlier, it might not have been set up already."
Design hummed. "Mmmm...how do you know that? It is not what happened. Those events did not come to pass." The Crpytic turned her twisting spiral head, clearly mimicking what she'd seen humans do to indicate confusion.
"They could have if I didn't-"
"But they did not!" Her voice bubbly and chipper, Design explained, "What has happened, has happened. We learn from here. We learn from there. We cannot learn from a place that never existed."
"Daddy?" A small voice called out, grabbing all of Kari's attention.
In an eyeblink, she was at her son's side, hand on his back as he sat up. "What is it, Gavinor? Did you have a bad dream?"
The child shook his head. "You said." His eyes watered with tears, but they didn't fall. Already, the Alethi expectations regarding when to show what you felt was being ingrained into him.
"I...I know I said I wouldn't leave again, but you were asleep, and..." And she was arguing with a child. Logic wouldn't help here. Taking a deep breath to steady herself, Kari gave her son the most motherly smile she could manage, trying to emulate the way her own mother looked at her. "Momma is sorry. She'll stay with you. Promise."
For a second, Gavinor looked confused, but then his eyes lit up and he nodded seriously. "Daddy is Momma now."
Starting to cry herself now, for the first time since they'd reached Shadesmar, Kari held her son close to her and nodded her head.
He was the one she could save. She'd at least done that right.
