Baladitya was an elderly, severely nearsighted copyist at the library of Taglios. In Water Sleeps, he was kidnapped by Sleepy to assist in translating the earliest Annals of the Black Company. Throughout Soldiers Live, he lived out the rest of his days in the fortress with no name blissfully recording the psychic communications of the prehistoric golem Shivetya.
Water Sleeps[]
Baladitya presumably spent most or all of his adult life copying manuscripts and tomes at the gigantic library of Taglios. His grandson would walk him home at the end of each day since he was effectively blind with advanced nearsightedness.
Baladitya, as well as the Master of the library Surendranath Santaraksita, were two of the main staffers at the library to be deceived by Sleepy, who feigned to be a lowly, illiterate boy sweeper. She was actually the Annalist of the underground Black Company in Taglios and its de facto leader. Her secret goal was to discover a key to safely pass through the Shadowgate, for the purpose of liberating the Captured from the glittering plain. One night, while Master Santaraksita was wasting time in a council called the bhadrhalok, Sleepy was left alone with Baladitya. She took advantage of the man's poor awareness of his surroundings to search inside the restricted stacks, where she found an original manuscript of missing Company Annals. She was forced to stop her illicit searching when Baladitya needed help finding his slippers so his grandson could walk him home.
When Sleepy made her move to kidnap Master Santaraksita, she also had Baladitya apprehended as well. They were both kept comfortable together in the Company's hideout, a warehouse owned by the Nyueng Bao collaborator Banh Do Trang, but were both forced to earn food by translating the earliest, crumbling Annals. They both took to their new duties well, with Baladitya only speaking up once to complain about the lack of food.
Both men were compliant, and accompanied Sleepy's group out of Taglios, southward, toward the Shadowgate. Master Santaraksita led the donkey which Baladitya rode. The copyist, his face buried in a book at all times, had a rope tied to his wrist which led a second donkey, one overladen with their books and library materials. He crossed the Shadowgate with them all, and was part of the procession onto the glittering plain.
Soldiers Live[]
Baladitya was permanently stationed at the feet of the immortal golem Shivetya, inside the fortress with no name, at the center of the glittering plain. He spent several joyful years transcribing histories via a direct mental connection to Shivetya. His most common human contact was with Blade, an ally who was stationed there to oversee Company affairs.
Baladitya learned from Shivetya that the mysterious standing stones which spotted the plain had been placed there by brave, talented wizards from ancient Khatovar. The old scholar was also tasked with doling out tiny quantities of the ashes of the Books of the Dead to Company men as they passed through, for random disposal, to ensure the evil papers were truly destroyed. He later spent considerable time with the First Father and Nashun the Researcher, two Voroshk patriarchs who holed up with Shivetya. From them he learned a new mythology cycle regarding Kina, and shared it in a letter to Tobo.
Using the High Taglian alphabet, the old copyist faithfully wrote down as much of Shivetya's biography as possible before passing away at his desk.