Eight months after the previous conflict, Kaladin rides in a caged slave wagon through the Unclaimed Hills, eating slop and resisting the paranoia gripping the other prisoners. Branded with shash—dangerous—he rebuffs fellow slaves’ pleas to include them in an escape, admitting he has tried and failed ten times. He remarks he once killed a lighteyes, but suggests his slavery stems from the lighteyes he did not kill.

The caravan, owned by the Thaylen slaver Tvlakv and guarded by mercenaries, cuts across lonely terrain where grass retracts from disturbances. Kaladin broods on his failures and resignation, fingering hidden blackbane leaves he took on impulse. A windspren—taking the form of a small, translucent girl—appears, unusually attentive and calling him by name, questioning why he has stopped fighting. Kaladin wonders if he is going mad.

That night, as Tvlakv rations water, a slave’s wet coughing worsens. Kaladin initially refuses to intervene, haunted by past failures, but his father’s medical lessons push him to act. He diagnoses the grinding coughs and instructs that the man be given frequent water with sugar to recover.

Instead of following the advice, Tvlakv orders his mercenary Bluth to remove the risk. Bluth clubs the slave to death by the fire. Enraged, Kaladin confronts Tvlakv, who coldly prioritizes his investment over one life. Kaladin resolves to poison Tvlakv using powdered blackbane in the slaver’s tea.

When Kaladin seizes the bars, the brittle blackbane falls from his hands and is blown away by a gust, ruining his plan. His attempt at vengeance fails like his escapes. The windspren flits nearby, perplexed, as Kaladin sinks back into defeat and exhaustion.