After sundown, with the tenth day approaching and Dalinar still trapped in the Spiritual Realm, Navani meets privately with Wit. Wit argues that if Odium severed Navani’s Connection to Dalinar and prevented their communication, that likely counts as interference under the contract; if Dalinar failed to arrive because of that, Odium would forfeit. Navani is shaken because the war is already going badly and so many rulers have surrendered, but Wit concludes that Odium probably intends Dalinar to return anyway, which means Odium must believe the gain is worth the risk.

Wit then reveals the truth Navani did not know: Taravangian, not Rayse, now holds Odium. The body found after Nightblood’s attack was almost certainly Rayse’s ruined remains, not proof that Taravangian died. Navani immediately sees why this is worse, not better: Taravangian understands them personally and will not merely want Dalinar absent, but broken and won over. Wit says that against a Shard neither he, Navani, the Stormfather, nor the Sibling can do anything meaningful, so they can only wait and hope Dalinar resists whatever version of Odium confronts him.

Elsewhere, Adolin fights in Azimir’s failing defenses at the dome. Exhausted beyond feeling, he holds a shield line with a spear while remembering the hopelessness of the Battle of the Tower. He realizes there are no reserves left, no more rotations, and no chance of relief. Across the dome, the last human Shardbearer, wearing Adolin’s Plate, is overwhelmed, and the singers begin chanting that the last human has fallen and the Shards are theirs.

The collapse worsens when Abidi the Monarch appears in Adolin’s captured Plate and with the captured Blade, breaking what remains of the defenders’ morale. The line shatters, Adolin is knocked down, and he nearly gives in to despair, linking this defeat to his deeper crisis of faith in Dalinar after learning the truth about his mother and to the feeling that all his loyalty and sacrifices have accomplished nothing. Anger finally drives him back to his feet. He braces himself on his peg leg, draws the sword Shallan gave him at their wedding, and fights alone in the chaos. When he refuses to summon Maya because he is ashamed to let her see him lose, Maya answers anyway, telling him there is no shame in loss and that she is coming. Even so, Adolin is badly wounded and finally brought down.

As a singer raises a halberd to finish him, Adolin realizes that despite everything he still wants the chance to see Dalinar again and make peace with him. An arrow kills the attacker, and a group of surviving defenders reaches him under cover from May’s archers. Colot and Hmask haul Adolin up, explaining that Emperor Yanagawn refused to leave without him. The remnant force retreats through connected buildings to the saferoom beneath the hospital, where Rahel gives what healing she can. When Adolin fully wakes, he sees the same defeated truth on every face around him: Azimir has fallen, and with it Azir is effectively lost.