The Hero of Ages

by Brandon Sanderson

Page 20

  Elend stood for a few moments, looking over their heads, appearing thoughtful. "I want you to tell me about the Survivor," he finally said.

  "He was lord of the mists," Demoux said immediately.

  "Not the rhetoric," Elend said. "Someone tell me about the man, Kelsier. I never met him, you know. I saw him once, right before he died, but I never knew him. "

  "Whats the point?" Cett asked. "Weve all heard the stories. Hes practically a god, if you listen to the skaa. "

  "Just do as I ask," Elend said.

  The tent was still for a few moments. Finally, Ham spoke. "Kell was . . . grand. He wasnt just a man, he was bigger than that. Everything he did was large—his dreams, the way he spoke, the way he thought. . . . "

  "And it wasnt false," Breeze added. "I can tell when a man is being a fake. Thats why I started my first job with Kelsier, actually. Amidst all the pretenders and posturers1, he was genuine. Everyone wanted to be the best. Kelsier really was. "

  "He was a man," Vin said quietly. "Just a man. Yet, you always knew hed succeed. He made you be what he wanted you to be. "

  "So he could use you," Breeze said.

  "But you were better when he was done with you," Ham added.

  Elend nodded slowly. "I wish I could have known him. Early in my career, I always compared myself to him. By the time I heard of Kelsier, he was already becoming a legend. It was unfair to force myself to try and be him, but I worried regardless. Anyway, those of you who knew him, maybe you can answer another question for me. What do you think hed say, if he saw us now?"

  "Hed be proud," Ham said immediately. "I mean, we defeated the Lord Ruler, and we built a skaa government. "

  "What if he saw us at this conference?" Elend said.

  The tent fell still again. When someone spoke what they were all thinking, it came from a source Vin hadnt expected.

  "Hed tell us to laugh more," Sazed whispered.

  Breeze chuckled. "He was completely insane, you know. The worse things got, the more hed joke. I remember how chipper he was the very day after one of our worst defeats, when we lost most of our skaa army to that fool Yeden. Kell walked in, a spring in his step, making one of his inane jokes. "

  "Sounds insensitive," Allrianne said.

  Ham shook his head. "No. He was just determined. He always said that laughter was something the Lord Ruler couldnt take from him. He planned and executed the overthrow of a thousand-year empire—and he did it as a kind of . . . penance for letting his wife die thinking that he hated her. But, he did it all with a smirk on his lips. Like every joke was his way of slapping fate in the face. "

  "We need what he had," Elend said.

  The rooms eyes turned back toward him.

  "We cant keep doing this," Elend said. "We bicker amongst ourselves, we mope about, watching the ash fall, convinced that were doomed. "

  Breeze chuckled. "I dont know if you noticed the earthquake a few minutes ago, my dear man, but the world appears to be ending. That is an indisputably depressing event. "

  Elend shook his head. "We can survive this. But, the only way that will happen is if our people dont give up. They need leaders who laugh, leaders who feel that this fight can be won. So, this is what I ask of you. I dont care if youre an optimist or a pessimist—I dont care if secretly, you think well all be dead before the month ends. On the outside, I want to see you smiling. Do it in defiance, if you have to. If the end does come, I want this group to meet that end smiling. As the Survivor taught us. "

  Slowly, the members of the former crew nodded—even Sazed, though his face seemed troubled.

  Cett just shook his head. "You people are all insane. How I ended up with you, Ill never know. "

  Breeze laughed. "Now, thats a lie, Cett. You know exactly how you ended up joining with us. We threatened to kill you if you didnt!"

  Elend was looking at Vin. She met his eyes, and nodded. It had been a good speech. She wasnt certain if his words would change anything—the crew could never again be the way it had been at th1e beginning, laughing freely around Clubss table in the evening hours. However, maybe if they kept Kelsiers smile in mind, theyd be less likely to forget just why it was they kept struggling on.

  "All right, people," Elend finally said. "Lets start preparations. Breeze, Sazed, Allrianne—Ill need you to talk with the scribes about supply estimates for your trip. Ham, send word to Luthadel and tell Penrod to have our scholars work on culturing plants that can grow in very little sunlight. Demoux, pass the word to the men. We march tomorrow. "

  Hemalurgy, it is called, because of the connection to blood. It is not a coincidence, I believe, that death is always involved in the transfer of powers via Hemalurgy. Marsh once described it as a "messy" process. Not the adjective I would have chosen. Its not disturbing enough.

  13

  IM MISSING SOMETHING, MARSH THOUGHT.

  He sat in the koloss camp. Just sitting. He hadnt moved in hours. Ash dusted him like a statue. Ruins attention had been focused elsewhere lately, and Marsh had been left with more and more time to himself.

  He still didnt struggle. Struggle just brought Ruins attention.

  Isnt that what I want? he thought. To be controlled? When Ruin forced him to see things its way, the dying world seemed wonderful. That bliss was far superior to the dread he felt while sitting on the stump, slowly being buried in ash.

  No. No, thats not what I want! It was bliss, true, but it was false. As he had once struggled against Ruin, he now struggled against his own sense of inevitability.

  What am I missing? he thought again, distracting himself. The koloss army—three hundred thousand strong—hadnt moved in weeks. Its members were slowly, yet relentlessly, killing each other. It seemed a waste of resources to let the army stagnate, even if the creatures could apparently eat even the dead plants beneath the ash to survive.

  They cant possibly live on that for long, can they? He didnt know much about the koloss, despite spending the better part of a year with them. They appeared to be able to eat almost anything, as if just filling their stomachs were more important than actual nutrition.

  What was Ruin waiting for? Why not take his army in and attack? Marsh was familiar enough with Final Empire geography to recognize that he was stationed in the North, near Terris. Why not move down and strike Luthadel?

  There were no other Inquisitors in the camp. Ruin had called them to other tasks, leaving Marsh alone. Of all the Inquisitors, Marsh had been given the largest number of new spikes—he had ten new ones planted at various places in his body. That ostensibly made him the most powerful of the Inquisitors. Why leave him behind?

  Yet . . . what does it matter? he wondered. The end has come. There is no way to beat Ruin. The world will end.

  He felt guilty for the thought. If he could have turned his eyes downward in shame, he would have. There had been a time when hed run the entire skaa rebellion. Thousands had looked to him for leadership. And then . . . Kelsier had been captured. As had Mare, the woman both Kelsier and Marsh had loved.

  When Kelsier and Mare had been cast into the Pits of Hathsin, Marsh had left the rebellion. His rationale had been simple. If 1the Lord Ruler could catch Kelsier—the most brilliant thief of his time—then he would catch Marsh eventually too. It hadnt been fear that had driven Marshs retirement, but simple realism. Marsh had always been practical. Fighting had proven useless. So why do it?

  And then Kelsier had returned and done what a thousand years of rebellious skaa hadnt been able to: Hed overthrown the empire, facilitating the death of the Lord Ruler himself.

  That should have been me, Marsh thought. I served the rebellion all my life, then gave up just before they finally won.

  It was a tragedy, and it was made worse by the fact that Marsh was doing it again. He was giving up.

  Damn you, Kelsier! he thought with frustration. Cant you leave me be even in death?

 
And yet, one harrowing, undeniable fact remained. Mare had been right. She had chosen Kelsier over Marsh. And then, when both men had been forced to deal with her death, one had given up.

  The other had made her dreams come true.

  Marsh knew why Kelsier had decided to overthrow the Final Empire. It hadnt been for the money, the fame, or even—as most suspected—for revenge. Kelsier knew Mares heart. Hed known that she dreamed of days when plants flourished and the sky was not red. Shed always carried with her that little picture of a flower, a copied copy of a copy—a depiction of something that had been lost to the Final Empire long ago.

  But, Marsh thought bitterly, you didnt make her dreams a reality, Kelsier. You failed. You killed the Lord Ruler, but that didnt fix anything. It made things worse!

  The ash continued to fall, blowing around Marsh in a lazy breeze. Koloss grunted, and in the near distance one screamed as his companion killed him.

  Kelsier was dead now. But, he had died for her dream. Mare had been right to pick him, but she was dead too. Marsh wasnt. Not yet. I can fight still, he told himself. But how? Even moving his finger would draw Ruins attention.

  Although, during the last few weeks, he hadnt struggled at all. Perhaps that was why Ruin decided it could leave Marsh alone for so long. The creature—or the force, or whatever it was—wasnt omnipotent. Marsh suspected, however, that it could move about freely, watching the world and seeing what was happening in various parts of it. No walls could block its view—it seemed to be able to watch anything.

  Except a mans mind.

  Perhaps . . . perhaps if I stop struggling long enough, Ill be able to surprise it when I finally do decide to strike.

  It seemed as good a plan as any. And, Marsh knew exactly what he would do, when the time came. Hed remove Ruins most useful tool. Hed pull the spike from his back and kill himself. Not out of frustration, and not out of despair. He knew that he had some important part to play in Ruins plans. If he removed himself at the right time, it could give the others the chance they needed.

  It was all he could give. Yet, it seemed fitting, and his new confidence made him wish he could stand and face the world with pride. Kelsier had killed himself to secure freedom for the skaa. Marsh would do the same—and in doing so, hope to help save the world itself from destruction.

  PART TWO

  CLOTH AND GLASS

  Ruins consciousness was trapped by the Well of Ascension, kept mostly impotent. That night, when we discovered the Well for the first time, we found something we didnt understand. A black smoke, clogging one of the rooms.

  Though we discussed it after the fact, we couldnt decide what that was. How could we possibly have known?

  The body of a god—or, rather, the power of a god, since the two are really the same thing. Ruin and Preservation inhabited power and energy in the same way a person inhabits flesh and blood.

  14

  SPOOK FLARED TIN.

  He let it burn within him—burn brightly, burn powerfully. He never turned it off anymore. He just left it on, letting it roar, a fire within him. Tin was one of the slowest-burning of metals, and it wasnt difficult to obtain in the amounts necessary for Allomancy.

  He moved down the silent street. Even with Kelsiers now-famous proclamations that the skaa need not fear the mists, few people went out at night. For, at night, the mists came. Deep and mysterious, dark and omnipresent, the mists were one of the great constants of the Final Empire. They came every night. Thicker than a simple fog, they swirled in definite patterns—almost as if the different banks, streams, and fronts of mist were living things. Almost playful, yet enigmatic.