The Final Empire

by Brandon Sanderson

  Vin awoke to wetness. She coughed, then groaned, feeling a sharp pain in the back of her skull. She opened dizzy eyes—blinking away the water that had been thrown on her—and immediately burned pewter and tin, bringing herself completely awake.

  A pair of rough hands hoisted her into the air. She coughed as the Inquisitor shoved something into her mouth.

  “Swallow,” he ordered, twisting her arm.

  Vin cried out, trying without success to resist the pain. Eventually, she gave in and swallowed the bit of metal.

  “Now burn it,” the Inquisitor ordered, twisting harder.

  Vin resisted nonetheless, sensing the unfamiliar metal reserve within her. The Inquisitor could be trying to get her to burn a useless metal, one that would make her sick—or, worse, kill her.

  But, there are easier ways to kill a captive, she thought in agony. Her arm hurt so much that it felt like it would twist free. Finally, Vin relented, burning the metal.

  Immediately, all of her other metal reserves vanished.

  “Good,” the Inquisitor said, dropping her to the ground. The stones were wet, pooled with a bucketful of water. The Inquisitor turned, leaving the cell and slamming its barred door; then he disappeared through a doorway on the other side of the room.

  Vin crawled to her knees, massaging her arm, trying to sort out what was going on. My metals! She searched desperately inside, but she found nothing. She couldn’t feel any metals, not even the one she had ingested moments before.

  What was it? A twelfth metal? Perhaps Allomancy wasn’t as limited as Kelsier and the others had always assured her.

  She took a few deep breaths, climbing to her knees, calming herself. There was something…Pushing against her. The Lord Ruler’s presence. She could feel it, though it wasn’t as powerful as it had been earlier, when he had killed Kelsier. Still, she didn’t have copper to burn—she had no way to hide from the Lord Ruler’s powerful, almost omnipotent, hand. She felt depression twisting her, telling her to just lie down, to give up….

  No! she thought. I have to get out. I have to stay strong!

  She forced herself to stand and inspect her surroundings. Her prison was more like a cage than a cell. It had bars running along three of the four sides, and it contained no furniture—not even a sleeping mat. There were two other cell-cages in the room, one to either side of her.

  She had been stripped, they had only left her with her undergarments. The move was probably to make certain that she didn’t have any hidden metals. She glanced around the room. It was long and thin, and had stark stone walls. A stool sat in one corner, but the room was otherwise empty.

  If I could find just a bit of metal…

  She began to search. Instinctively, she tried to burn iron, expecting the blue lines to appear—but, of course, she had no iron to burn. She shook her head at the foolish move, but it was simply a sign of how much she’d come to rely on her Allomancy. She felt…blinded. She couldn’t burn tin to listen for voices. She couldn’t burn pewter to strengthen her against the pain of her hurting arm and head. She couldn’t burn bronze to search for nearby Allomancers.

  Nothing. She had nothing.

  You functioned without Allomancy before, she told herself sternly. You can do it now.

  Even so, she searched the bare floor of her cell, hoping for the chance existence of a discarded pin or nail. She found nothing, so she turned her attention to the bars. However, she couldn’t think of a way to get off even a flake of the iron.

  So much metal here, she thought with frustration. And I can’t use any of it!

  She sat back on the ground, huddling up against the stone wall, shivering quietly in her damp clothing. It was still dark outside; the room’s window casually allowed in a few trails of mist. What had happened with the rebellion? What about her friends? She thought that the mists outside looked a bit brighter than usual. Torchlight in the night? Without tin, her senses were too weak to tell.

  What was I thinking? she thought with despair. Did I presume to succeed where Kelsier had failed? He knew that the Eleventh Metal was useless.

  It had done something, true—but it certainly hadn’t killed the Lord Ruler. She sat, thinking, trying to figure out what had happened. There had been an odd familiarity about the things the Eleventh Metal had shown her. Not because of the way the visions had appeared, but because of the way Vin had felt when burning the metal.

  Gold. The moment when I burned the Eleventh Metal felt like that time when Kelsier had me burn gold.

  Could it be that the Eleventh Metal wasn’t really “eleventh” at all? Gold and atium had always seemed oddly paired to Vin. All of the other metals came in pairs that were similar—a base metal, then its alloy, each doing opposite things. Iron Pulled, steel Pushed. Zinc Pulled, brass Pushed. It made sense. All except for atium and gold.

  What if the Eleventh Metal was really an alloy of atium or of gold? It would mean…that gold and atium aren’t paired. They do two different things. Similar, but different. They’re like…

  Like the other metals, which were grouped into larger bases of four. There were the physical metals: iron, steel, tin, and pewter. The mental metals: bronze, copper, zinc, and brass. And…there were the time-affecting metals: gold and its alloy, and atium and its alloy.

  That means there’s another metal. One that hasn’t been discovered—probably because atium and gold are too valuable to forge into different alloys.

  But, what good was the knowledge? Her “Eleventh Metal” was probably just a paired opposite of gold—the metal Kelsier had told her was the most useless of them all. Gold had shown Vin herself—or, at least, a different version of her that had felt real enough to touch. But, it had simply been a vision of what she could have become, had the past been different.

  The Eleventh Metal had done something similar: Instead of showing Vin’s own past, it had shown her similar images from other people. And that told her…nothing. What difference did it make what the Lord Ruler could have been? It was the current man, the tyrant that ruled the Final Empire, that she had to defeat.

  A figure appeared in the doorway—an Inquisitor dressed in a black robe, the hood up. His face was shadowed, but his spike-heads jutted from the front of the cowl.

  “It is time,” he said. Another Inquisitor waited in the doorway as the first creature pulled out a set of keys and moved to open Vin’s door.

  Vin tensed. The door clicked, and she sprang to her feet, scrambling forward.

  Have I always been this slow without pewter? she thought with horror. The Inquisitor snatched her arm as she passed, his motions unconcerned, almost casual—and she could see why. His hands moved supernaturally quickly, making her seem even more sluggish by comparison.

  The Inquisitor pulled her up, twisting her and easily holding her. He smiled with an evil grin, his face pocked with scars. Scars that looked like…

  Arrowhead wounds, she thought with shock. But…healed already? How can it be?

  She struggled, but her weak, pewterless body was no match for the Inquisitor’s strength. The creature carried her toward the doorway, and the second Inquisitor stepped back, regarding her with spikes that peeked out from beneath its cowl. Though the Inquisitor who carried her was smiling, this second one had a flat line of a mouth.

  Vin spat at the second Inquisitor as she passed, her spittle smacking it right on one of its spike-heads. Her captor carried her out of the chamber and through a narrow hallway. She cried out for help, knowing that her screams—in the middle of Kredik Shaw itself—would be useless. At least she succeeded in annoying the Inquisitor, for he twisted her arm.

  “Quiet,” he said as she grunted in pain.

  Vin fell silent, instead focusing on their location. They were probably in one of the lower sections of the palace; the hallways were too long to be in a tower or spire. The decorations were lavish, but the rooms looked…unused. The carpets were pristine, the furniture unmarked by scuff or scratch. She had the feeling that the murals were
rarely seen, even by those who often passed through the chambers.

  Eventually, the Inquisitors entered a stairwell and began to climb. One of the spires, she thought.

  With each climbing step, Vin could feel the Lord Ruler getting closer. His mere presence dampened her emotions, stealing her willpower, making her numb to everything but lonely depression. She sagged in the Inquisitor’s grip, no longer struggling. It took all of her energy to simply resist the Lord Ruler’s pressure on her soul.

  After a short time in the tunnel-like stairwell, the Inquisitors carried her out into a large, circular room. And, despite the power of the Lord Ruler’s Soothing, despite her visits to noble keeps, Vin took just a brief moment to stare at her surroundings. They were majestic like none she’d ever seen.

  The room was shaped like a massive, stocky cylinder. The wall—there was only one, running in a wide circle—was made entirely of glass. Lit by fires from behind, the room glowed with spectral light. The glass was colored, though it didn’t depict any specific scene. Instead, it seemed crafted from a single sheet, the colors blown and melded together in long, thin trails. Like…

  Like mist, she thought with wonder. Colorful streams of mist, running in a circle around the entire room.

  The Lord Ruler sat in an elevated throne in the very center of the room. He wasn’t the old Lord Ruler—this was the younger version, the handsome man who had killed Kelsier.

  Some kind of impostor? No, I can feel him—just as I could feel the one before. They’re the same man. Can he change how he looks, then? Appearing young when he wishes to put forth a pretty face?

  A small group of gray-robed, eye-tattooed obligators stood conversing on the far side of the room. Seven Inquisitors stood waiting, like a row of shadows with iron eyes. That made nine of them in all, counting the two that had escorted Vin. Her scar-faced captor delivered her to one of the others, who held her with a similarly inescapable grip.

  “Let us be on with this,” said the Lord Ruler.

  A regular obligator stepped forward, bowing. With a chill, she realized that she recognized him.

  Lord Prelan Tevidian, she thought, eyeing the thin balding man. My…father.

  “My lord,” Tevidian said, “forgive me, but I do not understand. We have already discussed this matter!”

  “The Inquisitors say they have more to add,” the Lord Ruler said in a tired voice.

  Tevidian eyed Vin, frowning in confusion. He doesn’t know who I am, she thought. He never knew he was a father.

  “My lord,” Tevidian said, turning away from her. “Look outside your window! Do we not have better things to discuss? The entire city is in rebellion! Skaa torches light up the night, and they dare go out into the mists. They blaspheme in riots, attacking the keeps of the nobility!”

  “Let them,” the Lord Ruler said in an uncaring voice. He seemed so…worn. He sat strongly on his throne, but there was still a weariness to his posture and his voice.

  “But my lord!” Tevidian said. “The Great Houses are falling!”

  The Lord Ruler waved a dismissive hand. “It is good for them to get purged every century or so. It fosters instability, keeps the aristocracy from growing too confident. Usually, I let them kill each other in one of their foolish wars, but these riots will work.”

  “And…if the skaa come to the palace?”

  “Then I will deal with them,” the Lord Ruler said softly. “You will not question this further.”

  “Yes, my lord,” Tevidian said, bowing and backing away.

  “Now,” the Lord Ruler said, turning to the Inquisitors. “What is it you wished to present?”

  The scarred Inquisitor stepped forward. “Lord Ruler, we wish to petition that leadership of your Ministry be taken from these…men and granted to the Inquisitors instead.”

  “We have discussed this,” the Lord Ruler said. “You and your brothers are needed for more important tasks. You are too valuable to waste on simple administration.”

  “But,” the Inquisitor said, “by allowing common men to rule your Ministry, you have unwittingly allowed corruption and vice to enter the very heart of your holy palace!”

  “Idle claims!” Tevidian spat. “You say such things often, Kar, but you never offer any proof.”

  Kar turned slowly, his eerie smile lit by the twisting, colored windowlight. Vin shivered. That smile was nearly as unsettling as the Lord Ruler’s Soothing.

  “Proof?” Kar asked. “Why, tell me, Lord Prelan. Do you recognize that girl?”

  “Bah, of course not!” Tevidian said with a wave of his hand. “What does a skaa girl have to do with the government of the Ministry?”

  “Everything,” Kar said, turning to Vin. “Oh, yes…everything. Tell the Lord Ruler who your father is, child.”

  Vin tried to squirm, but the Lord Ruler’s Allomancy was so oppressive, the Inquisitor’s hands were so strong. “I don’t know,” she managed to say through gritted teeth.

  The Lord Ruler perked up slightly, turning toward her, leaning forward.

  “You cannot lie to the Lord Ruler, child,” Kar said in a quiet, rasping voice. “He has lived for centuries, and has learned to use Allomancy like no mortal man. He can see things in the way your heart beats, and can read your emotions in your eyes. He can sense the moment when you lie. He knows…oh, yes. He knows.”

  “I never knew my father,” Vin said stubbornly. If the Inquisitor wanted to know something, then keeping it a secret seemed like a good idea. “I’m just a street urchin.”

  “A Mistborn street urchin?” Kar asked. “Why, that’s interesting. Isn’t it, Tevidian?”

  The lord prelan paused, his frown deepening. The Lord Ruler stood slowly, walking down the steps of his dais toward Vin.

  “Yes, my lord,” Kar said. “You felt her Allomancy earlier. You know that she is a full Mistborn—an amazingly powerful one. Yet, she claims to have grown up on the street. What noble house would have abandoned such a child? Why, for her to have such strength, she must be of an extremely pure line. At least…one of her parents must have been from a very pure line.”

  “What are you implying?” Tevidian demanded, paling.

  The Lord Ruler ignored them both. He strode through the streaming colors of the reflective floor, then stopped right in front of Vin.

  So close, she thought. His Soothing was so strong that she couldn’t even feel terror—all she felt was the deep, overpowering, horrible sorrow.

  The Lord Ruler reached out with delicate hands, taking her by the cheeks, tilting her face up to look into his eyes. “Who is your father, girl?” he asked quietly.

  “I…” Despair twisted inside of her. Grief, pain, a desire to die.

  The Lord Ruler held her face close to his own, looking into her eyes. In that moment, she knew the truth. She could see a piece of him; she could sense his power. His…godlike power.

  He wasn’t worried about the skaa rebellion. Why would he have to worry? If he wished, he could slaughter every person in the city by himself. Vin knew it to be the truth. It might take him time, but he could kill forever, tirelessly. He need fear no rebellion.

  He’d never needed to. Kelsier had made a terrible, terrible mistake.

  “Your father, child,” the Lord Ruler prompted, his demand like a physical weight upon her soul.

  Vin spoke despite herself. “My…brother told me that my father was that man over there. The lord prelan.” Tears rolled down her cheeks, though when the Lord Ruler turned from her, she couldn’t quite remember why she had been crying.

  “It’s a lie, my lord!” Tevidian said, backing away. “What does she know? She’s just a silly child.”

  “Tell me truthfully, Tevidian,” the Lord Ruler said, walking slowly toward the obligator. “Have you ever bedded a skaa woman?”

  The obligator paused. “I followed the law! Each time, I had them slain afterward.”

  “You…lie,” the Lord Ruler said, as if surprised. “You’re uncertain.”

  Tevidian
was visibly shaking. “I…I think I got them all, my lord. There…there was one I may have been too lax with. I didn’t know she was skaa at first. The soldier I sent to kill her was too lenient, and he let her go. But I found her, eventually.”

  “Tell me,” the Lord Ruler said. “Did this woman bear any children?”

  The room fell silent.

  “Yes, my lord,” the high prelan said.

  The Lord Ruler closed his eyes, sighing. He turned back toward his throne. “He is yours,” he said to the Inquisitors.

  Immediately, six Inquisitors dashed across the room, howling in joy, pulling obsidian knives from sheaths beneath their robes. Tevidian raised his arms, crying out as the Inquisitors fell on him, exulting in their brutality. Blood flew as they plunged their daggers over and over again into the dying man. The other obligators backed away, looking on in horror.

  Kar remained behind, smiling as he watched the massacre, as did the Inquisitor who was Vin’s captor. One other Inquisitor remained back as well, though Vin didn’t know why.

  “Your point is proven, Kar,” the Lord Ruler said, sitting wearily on his throne. “It seems that I have trusted too much in the…obedience of mankind. I did not make a mistake. I have never made a mistake. However, it is time for a change. Gather the high prelans and bring them here—rouse them from their beds, if need be. They will witness as I grant the Canton of Inquisition command and authority over the Ministry.”

  Kar’s smile deepened.

  “The half-breed child will be destroyed.”

  “Of course, my lord,” Kar said. “Though…there are some questions I wish to ask her first. She was part of a team of skaa Mistings. If she can help us locate the others…”

  “Very well,” the Lord Ruler said. “That is your duty, after all.”

  Is there anything more beautiful than the sun? I often watch it rise, for my restless sleep usually awakens me before dawn.

  Each time I see its calm yellow light peeking above the horizon, I grow a little more determined, a little more hopeful. In a way, it is the thing that has kept me going all this time.