West smiled, even though his chest ached with the emptiness where her memory of him once lived. He had braced for this. Had prepared, in his own way, to become her stranger so she could be whole.
He nodded. "You don't have to know me. You only have to live."
She touched her chest, where the remnants of the Veilbrand now glimmered softly, like a scar stitched with light. "This power… it doesn't feel like mine."
"It's not," Sebastian murmured from behind. "It's his now."
Frost turned to West, confusion and awe warring in her expression. "Why?"
West stood on shaking legs, the remnants of stormlight pulsing through his veins. He felt heavier now—not in burden, but in meaning. "Because I remembered you when you couldn't. Because you bore the storm alone for too long."
She looked at him as if searching for something in the lines of his face. "Who were you to me?"
