Fleet

Fleet (Words of Radiance Chapter 59)
Close your eyes. What do you see?
In the driest part of the Brightest Day, the man set off from the eastern sea. And where he went or why he ran the answer comes for you from me. He ran from the storm.
The Man was Fleet whose name you know, he’s spoken of in song and lore. The fastest man ‘ere known to live, the surest feet ‘ere known to run.
In time long past in times I’ve known. He raced the Herald Chanarach. He won that race as he did each one. But now the time for defeat had come.
For Fleet so sure, and Fleet so quick to all who heard, he yelled his goal, to beat the wind and race a storm!
A claim so brash a claim too bold, to race the wind? It can’t be done!
Undaunted, Fleet was set to run!
So to the East there went our Fleet, upon the shore his mark was set. The storm grew strong, the storm grew wild!
Who was this man so set to dash? No man should tempt the God of Storms, no fool has ever been so rash.
With a clap of Thunder, the race begins.
O’re rock and grass, our Fleet did run. He leaped the stones and dodged the trees, his feet a blur, his Soul a Sun. The storm, so grand, it raged and spun but away from it, our Fleet did run. The lead was his, the wind behind. Did man now prove that storms could lose?
Through land he ran, so quick and sure, and Alethkar he left behind! But now the test he saw ahead. For mountains he would have to climb. The Storm surged on, released a howl! It saw its chance might now approach. To the highest mounts and the coldest peaks, our hero Fleet did make his way. The slopes were steep, and paths unsure, would he maintain his mighty lead?
No! The storm grew close till it chewed his heels. Upon his neck, Fleet felt its chill. Its breadth of ice was all around, a mouth of night and wings of frost, its voice was of the breaking rocks, its song was of the crashing rain.
Then the tip he reached, the point he found! Fleet climbed no more, he crossed the peak, and down the side, his speed returned! Outside the storm, Fleet found the Sun. Azir’s planes were now his path. He sprinted West, more broad his stride!
Yet soon the race, its tool did claim, his feet like bricks, his legs like cloth. In gasps our runner drew his breath, the end approached, the storm outdone, but slowly did our hero run.
A final challenge did raise its head. A final shadow to his dread. The land did rise up once again! The mystic mountains guarding Shin! To leave the storming winds behind, our Fleet again began to climb! The storms again came to his back, the winds again did spin around! Time was short, the ending near, as through the mountains our Fleet did dash. It was right upon him, even going down the other side of the mountains he was unable to stay very far ahead. He crossed the peaks, but lost his lead!
The last paths lay before his feet, but strength he’d spent and might he’d lost. Each step was toil, each breath a pain. A sunken land, crossed with grief. The grass so dead it did not move. But here the storm, it too did wilt. With thunder lost and lightning spent, the drops slipped down, now weak as wet. For Shin is not a place for them. Ahead, the sea. The race’s end! Fleet stayed ahead, his muscles raw. Eyes barely saw, legs barely walked. But on he went, to destiny.
The end you know, the end will live. A shock for men, to me you’ll give.
He died? Well, I can work with that.
Upon that land of dirt and soil, our hero fell and did not stir! His body spent, his strength undone, Fleet the hero was no more! The storm approached and found him there, it’s still and stopped upon its course. The rains, they fell. The winds, they blew. But forward, they could not progress. For Glory lit and light alive, for goals unreached and aims to strive. All men must try, the winds did see. It is the test, it is the dream.
So in that land of dirt and soil, our hero stopped the storm itself. And while the rain came down, like tears, our Fleet refused to end this race.
His body dead, but not his will; within those winds, his soul did rise. It flew upon the day’s last song, to win the race and claim the dawn. Past the sea and past the waves, our Fleet no longer lost his breath. Forever strong, forever fast, forever free to race the wind.
The Girl Who Looked Up (Oathbringer Chapters 25 and 82)
There was a girl. This was before the storms, before memories, and before legends - but there was still a girl. She wore a long scarf to blow in the wind.
The girl in the scarf played and danced, as girls do today. In fact, most things were the same then as they are today. Except for two big differences. The wall, and the lack of light.
You see, in those days, a wall kept out the storms. It had existed for so long, nobody knew how it had been built. That did not bother them. Why wonder when the mountains began or why the sky was high? Like these things were, so the wall was.
Of course, even without light, people still had to live, didn’t they? That’s what people do. I hasten to guess that’s the first thing they learn how to do. So they lived in darkness, farmed in darkness, ate in darkness.
The girl was curious. So, she asked. “Why is there a wall?” She asked the man selling fruit.
“To keep the bad things out,” he replied.
“What bad things?”
“Very bad things. There is a wall. Do not go beyond it, or you shall die.”
The fruit seller picked up his cart and moved away. And still, the girl looked up at the wall.
“Why is there a wall?” She asked the woman suckling her child.
“To protect us,” the woman said.
“To protect us from what?”
“Very bad things. There is a wall. Do not go beyond it, or you shall die.” The woman took her child and left. The girl climbed a tree, peeking out the top, her scarf streaming behind her.
“Why is there a wall?” She asked the boy sleeping lazily in the nook of a branch.
“What wall?” The boy asked.
The girl thrust her finger pointedly towards the wall, shrouded in darkness.
“That’s not a wall, that’s just the way the sky is over there.”
“It’s a wall,” the girl replied. “A giant wall.”
“It must be there on purpose,” the boy said. “Yes, it is a wall. Don’t go beyond it, you’ll probably die.”
Well, these answers didn’t satisfy the girl who looked up. She reasoned to herself, if the wall kept evil things out, then the space on this side of it should be safe. So, one night while the others of the village slept, she sneaked from her home with a bundle of supplies. She walked towards the wall, and indeed the land was safe. But it was still so dark. Always in the shadow of the wall. No sunlight, ever, directly reached the people.
The girl traveled far. No predators hunted her, and no storms assaulted her. The only wind was the pleasant one that played with her scarf, and the only creatures she saw were the cremlings that clicked at her as she walked.
At long last, the girl in the scarves stood before the wall. It was truly expansive, running as far as she could see in either direction. And its height! It reached almost to the Tranquiline Halls!
And so, she decided that the only way that she’d find answers would be to climb the wall herself.
Was she stupid or bold?
I believe she was both. If nobody asks questions, then we never learn. However, what of the wisdom of her elders? They offered no explanation, no rationalization of the wall. There might just be a difference between listening to your elders, and being just as frightened as everyone else.
She didn’t turn back. She climbed. There were outcroppings on the wall, things like these spikes or hunched, ugly statues. She had climbed the highest trees all through her youth. She could do this.
The climb took days. At night, the girl who looked up would tie herself a hammock out of her scarf and sleep there. She picked out her village at one point, remarking on how small it seemed, now that she was high.
As she neared the top, she finally began to fear what she would find on the other side. Unfortunately, this fear did not stop her. She was young, and questions bothered her more than fear. So it was that she finally struggled to the very top and stood to see the other side. The hidden side…
...and on that side of the wall, the girl saw steps.
The girl stared at those steps, and suddenly the gruesome statues on her side of the wall made sense. The spears. The way everything was cast into shadow. The wall did indeed hide something evil, something frightening. It was the people, like the girl and her village.
Beyond the wall… beyond the wall was God’s Light.
The girl who looked up climbed down the steps. She hid among the creatures who lived on this side. She sneaked to the Light and she brought it back with her. To the other side. To the land of shadows.
An incredible escape. A frantic climb up the steps, and a crazed descent down the wall.
And then…
Light. For the first time in the village, there was light. Followed then by the coming of the storms, boiling of the wall.
The people suffered, but each storm brought light renewed, for it could never be put back now that it had been taken. And people, for all their hardship, would never choose to go back. Now that they could see.