He just seemed calm.
“This is what we are, Vin,” he said quietly. Wind and mist whipped around them as they fell, the tassels of Vin’s mistcloak writhing in the air around Zane. “Why do you play their games? Why do you let them control you?”
Vin placed her hand lightly against Zane’s chest, then Pushed on the coin that had been in her palm. The force of the Push lurched her free of his grip, flipping him up and backward. She caught herself just a few feet from the ground, Pushing against fallen coins, throwing herself upward again.
She passed Zane in the night, and saw a smile on his face as he fell. Vin reached downward, locking on to the blue lines extending toward the ground far below, then flared iron and Pulled against all of them at once. Blue lines zipped around her, the coins rising and rising shooting past the surprised Zane.
She Pulled a few choice coins into her hands. Let’s see if you can stay in the air now, Vin thought with a smile, Pushing outward, spraying the other coins away into the night. Zane continued to fall.
Vin began to fall as well. She threw a coin to each side, then Pushed. The coins shot into the mists, flying toward the stone walls to either side. Coins slapped against stone, and Vin lurched to a halt in the air.
She Pushed hard, holding herself in place, anticipating a Pull from below. If he pulls, I Pull, too, she thought. We both fall, and I keep the coins between us in the air. He’ll hit the ground first.
A coin shot past her in the air.
What! Where did he get that! She’d been sure that she’d Pushed away every coin below.
The coin arced upward, through the mists, trailing a blue line visible to her Allomancer’s eyes. It crested the top of the wall to her right. Vin glanced down just in time to see Zane slow, then lurch upward—Pulling on the coin that was now held in place atop the wall by the stone railing.
He passed her with a self-satisfied look on his face.
Show-off.
Vin let go of the coin to her left while still Pushing to her right. She lurched to the left, nearly colliding with the wall before she threw another coin at it. She Pushed on this one, throwing herself upward and to the right. Another coin sent her back upward to the left, and she continued to bounce between the walls, back and forth, until she crested the top.
She smiled as she twisted in the air. Zane—hovering in the air above the wall’s top—nodded appreciatively as she passed. She noticed that he’d grabbed a few of her discarded coins.
Time for a little attack myself, Vin thought.
She slammed a Push against the coins in Zane’s hand, and they shot her upward. However, Zane was still Pushing against the coin on the wall top below, and so he didn’t fall. Instead he hung in the air between the two forces—his own Push forcing him upward, Vin’s Push forcing him downward.
Vin heard him grunt in exertion, and she Pushed harder. She was so focused, however, that she barely saw him open his other hand and Push a coin up toward her. She reached out to Push against it, but fortunately his aim was off, and the coin missed her by a few inches.
Or perhaps it didn’t. Immediately, the coin zipped back downward and hit her in the back. Zane Pulled on it forcefully, and the bit of metal dug into Vin’s skin. She gasped, flaring pewter to keep the coin from cutting through her.
Zane didn’t relent. Vin gritted her teeth, but he weighed much more than she did. She inched down toward him in the night, her Push straining to keep the two of them apart, the coin digging painfully into her back.
Never get into a raw Pushing match, Vin, Kelsier had warned her. You don’t weigh enough—you’ll lose every time.
She stopped Pushing on the coin in Zane’s hand. Immediately, she fell, Pulled by the coin on her back. She Pushed on it slightly, giving herself a little leverage, then threw her final coin to the side. It hit at the last moment, and Vin’s Push scooted her out from between Zane and his coin.
Zane’s coin snapped him in the chest, and he grunted: he had obviously been trying to get Vin to collide with him again. Vin smiled, then Pulled against the coin in Zane’s hand.
Give him what he wants, I guess.
He turned just in time to see her slam feet-first into him. Vin spun, feeling him crumple beneath her. She exulted in the victory, spinning in the air above the wall walk. Then she noticed something: several faint lines of blue disappearing into the distance. Zane had pushed all of their coins away.
Desperately, Vin grabbed one of the coins and Pulled it back. Too late, however. She searched frantically for a closer source of metal, but all was stone or wood. Disoriented, she hit the stone wall walk, tumbling amid her mistcloak until she came to a halt beside the wall’s stone railing.
She shook her head and flared tin, clearing her vision with a flash of pain and other senses. Surely Zane hadn’t fared better. He must have fallen as—
Zane hung a few feet away. He’d found a coin—Vin couldn’t fathom how—and was Pushing against it below him. However, he didn’t shoot away. He hovered above the wall top, just a few feet in the air, still in a half tumble from Vin’s kick.
As Vin watched, Zane rotated slowly in the air, hand outstretched beneath him, twisting like a skilled acrobat on a pole. There was a look of intense concentration on his face, and his muscles—all of them, arms, face, chest—were taut. He turned in the air until he was facing her.
Vin watched with awe. It was possible to Push just slightly against a coin, regulating the amount of force with which one was thrown backward. It was incredibly difficult, however—so difficult that even Kelsier had struggled with it. Most of the time, Mistborn simply used short bursts. When Vin fell, for instance, she slowed herself by throwing a coin and Pushing against it briefly—but powerfully—to counteract her momentum.
She’d never seen an Allomancer with as much control as Zane. His ability to push slightly against that coin would be of little use in a fight; it obviously took too much concentration. Yet, there was a grace to it, a beauty to his movements that implied something Vin herself had felt.
Allomancy wasn’t just about fighting and killing. It was about skill and grace. It was something beautiful.
Zane rotated until he was upright, standing in a gentleman’s posture. Then he dropped to the wall walk, his feet slapping quietly against the stones. He regarded Vin—who still lay on the stones—with a look that lacked contempt.
“You are very skilled,” he said. “And quite powerful.”
He was tall, impressive. Like…Kelsier. “Why did you come to the palace today?” she asked, climbing to her feet.
“To see how they treated you. Tell me, Vin. What is it about Mistborn that makes us—despite our powers—so willing to act as slaves to others?”
“Slaves?” Vin said. “I’m no slave.”
Zane shook his head. “They use you, Vin.”
“Sometimes it’s good to be useful.”
“Those words are spoken of insecurity.”
Vin paused; then she eyed him. “Where did you get that coin, at the end? There were none nearby.”
Zane smiled, then opened his mouth and pulled out a coin. He dropped it to the stones with a pling. Vin opened her eyes wide. Metal inside a person’s body can’t be affected by another Allomancer…. That’s such an easy trick! Why didn’t I think of it?
Why didn’t Kelsier think of it?
Zane shook his head. “We don’t belong with them, Vin. We don’t belong in their world. We belong here, in the mists.”
“I belong with those who love me,” Vin said.
“Love you?” Zane asked quietly. “Tell me. Do they understand you, Vin? Can they understand you? And, can a man love something he doesn’t understand?”
He watched her for a moment. When she didn’t respond, he nodded to her slightly, then Pushed against the coin he had dropped moments before, throwing himself back into the mists.
Vin let him go. His words held more weight than he probably understood. We don’t belong in their world…. He couldn’t k
now that she’d been pondering her place, wondering whether she was noblewoman, assassin, or something else.
Zane’s words, then, meant something important. He felt himself to be an outsider. A little like herself. It was a weakness in him, certainly. Perhaps she could turn him against Straff—his willingness to spar with her, his willingness to reveal himself, hinted at that much.
She breathed in deeply of the cool, mist air, her heart still beating quickly from the exchange. She felt tired, yet alive, from fighting someone who might actually be better than she was. Standing in the mists atop the wall of an abandoned keep, she decided something.
She had to keep sparring with Zane.
18
If only the Deepness hadn’t come when it did, providing a threat that drove men to desperation both in action and belief.
“Kill him,” God whispered.
Zane hung quietly in the mists, looking through Elend Venture’s open balcony doors. The mists swirled around him, obscuring him from the king’s view.
“You should kill him,” God said again.
In a way, Zane hated Elend, though he had never met the man before today. Elend was everything that Zane should have been. Favored. Privileged. Pampered. He was Zane’s enemy, a block in the road to domination, the thing that was keeping Straff—and therefore Zane—from ruling the Central Dominance.
But he was also Zane’s brother.
Zane let himself drop through the mists, falling silently to the ground outside Keep Venture. He Pulled his anchors up into his hand—three small bars he had been pushing on to hold himself in place. Vin would be returning soon, and he didn’t want to be near the keep when she did. She had a strange ability to know where he was; her senses were far more keen than any Allomancer he had ever known or fought. Of course, she had been trained by the Survivor himself.
I would have liked to have known him, Zane thought as he moved quietly across the courtyard. He was a man who understood the power of being Mistborn. A man who didn’t let others control him.
A man who did what had to be done, no matter how ruthless it seemed. Or so the rumors said.
Zane paused beside the outer keep wall, below a buttress. He stooped, removing a cobblestone, and found the message left there by his spy inside Elend’s palace. Zane retrieved it, replaced the cobblestone, then dropped a coin and launched himself out into the night.
Zane did not slink. Nor did he creep, skulk, or cower. In fact, he didn’t even like to hide.
So, he approached the Venture army camp with a determined stride. It seemed to him that Mistborn spent too much of their existence hiding. True, anonymity offered some limited freedom. However, his experience had been that it bound them more than it freed them. It let them be controlled, and it let society pretend that they didn’t exist.
Zane strode toward a guard post, where two soldiers sat beside a large fire. He shook his head; they were virtually useless, blinded by the firelight. Normal men feared the mists, and that made them less valuable. That wasn’t arrogance; it was a simple fact. Allomancers were more useful, and therefore more valuable, than normal men. That was why Zane had Tineyes watching in the darkness as well. These regular soldiers were more a formality than anything else.
“Kill them,” God commanded as Zane walked up to the guard post. Zane ignored the voice, though it was growing more and more difficult to do so.
“Halt!” one of the guards said, lowering a spear. “Who is that?”
Zane Pushed the spear offhandedly, flipping up the tip. “Who else would it be?” he snapped, walking into the firelight.
“Lord Zane!” the other soldier said.
“Summon the king,” Zane said, passing the guard post. “Tell him to meet me in the command tent.”
“But, my lord,” the guard said. “The hour is late. His Majesty is probably…”
Zane turned, giving the guard a flat stare. The mists swirled between them. Zane didn’t even have to use emotional Allomancy on the soldier; the man simply saluted, then rushed off into the night to do as commanded.
Zane strode through the camp. He wore no uniform or mistcloak, but soldiers stopped and saluted as he passed. This was the way it should be. They knew him, knew what he was, knew to respect him.
And yet, a part of him acknowledged that if Straff hadn’t kept his bastard son hidden, Zane might not be the powerful weapon that he was today. That secrecy had forced Zane to live a life of near squalor while his half brother, Elend, had been privileged. But it also meant that Straff had been able to keep Zane hidden for most of his life. Even still, while rumors were growing about the existence of Straff’s Mistborn, few realized that Zane was Straff’s son.
Plus, living a harsh life had taught Zane to survive on his own. He had become hard, and powerful. Things he suspected Elend would never understand. Unfortunately, one side effect of his childhood was that it had apparently driven him mad.
“Kill him,” God whispered as Zane passed another guard. The voice spoke every time he saw a person—it was Zane’s quiet, constant companion. He understood that he was insane. It hadn’t really been all that hard to determine, all things considered. Normal people did not hear voices. Zane did.
He found insanity no excuse, however, for irrational behavior. Some men were blind, others had poor tempers. Still others heard voices. It was all the same, in the end. A man was defined not by his flaws, but by how he overcame them.
And so, Zane ignored the voice. He killed when he wanted to, not when it commanded. In his estimation, he was actually quite lucky. Other madmen saw visions, or couldn’t distinguish their delusions from reality. Zane, at least, could control himself.
For the most part.
He Pushed on the metal clasps on the flaps of the command tent. The flaps flipped backward, opening for him as the soldiers to either side saluted. Zane ducked inside.
“My lord!” said the nightwatch officer of command.
“Kill him,” God said. “He’s really not that important.”
“Paper,” Zane ordered, walking to the room’s large table. The officer scrambled to comply, grabbing a stack of sheets. Zane Pulled on the nib of a pen, flipping it across the room to his waiting hand. The officer brought the ink.
“These are troop concentrations and night patrols,” Zane said, scribbling down some numbers and diagrams on the paper. “I observed them tonight, while I was in Luthadel.”
“Very good, my lord,” the soldier said. “We appreciate your help.”
Zane paused. Then he slowly continued to write. “Soldier, you are not my superior. You aren’t even my equal. I am not ‘helping’ you. I am seeing to the needs of my army. Do you understand?”
“Of course, my lord.”
“Good,” Zane said, finishing his notes and handing the paper to the soldier. “Now, leave—or I’ll do as a friend has suggested and ram this pen through your throat.”
The soldier accepted the paper, then quickly withdrew. Zane waited impatiently. Straff did not arrive. Finally, Zane cursed quietly and Pushed open the tent flaps and strode out. Straff’s tent was a blazing red beacon in the night, well lit by numerous lanterns. Zane passed the guards, who knew better than to bother him, and entered the king’s tent.
Straff was having a late dinner. He was a tall man, brown of hair like both his sons—the two important ones, at least. He had fine nobleman’s hands, which he used to eat with finesse. He didn’t react as Zane entered.
“You’re late,” Straff said.
“Kill him,” God said.
Zane clinched his fists. This command from the voice was the hardest to ignore. “Yes,” he said. “I’m late.”
“What happened tonight?” Straff asked.
Zane glanced at the servants. “We should do this in the command tent.”
Straff continued to sip his soup, staying where he was, implying that Zane had no power to order him about. It was frustrating, but not unexpected. Zane had used virtually the same tactic on the nightwatch offi
cer just moments before. He had learned from the best.
Finally, Zane sighed, taking a seat. He rested his arms on the table, idly spinning a dinner knife as he watched his father eat. A servant approached to ask Zane if he wanted a meal, but he waved the man away.
“Kill Straff,” God commanded. “You should be in his place. You are stronger than he is. You are more competent.”
But I’m not as sane, Zane thought.
“Well?” Straff asked. “Do they have the Lord Ruler’s atium or not?”
“I’m not sure,” Zane said.
“Does the girl trust you?” Straff asked.
“She’s beginning to,” Zane said. “I did see her use atium, that once, fighting Cett’s assassins.”
Straff nodded thoughtfully. He really was competent; because of him, the Northern Dominance had avoided the chaos that prevailed in the rest of the Final Empire. Straff’s skaa remained under control, his noblemen quelled. True, he had been forced to execute a number of people to prove that he was in charge. But, he did what needed to be done. That was one attribute in a man that Zane respected above all others.
Especially since he had trouble displaying it himself.
“Kill him!” God yelled. “You hate him! He kept you in squalor, forcing you to fight for your survival as a child.”
He made me strong, Zane thought.
“Then use that strength to kill him!”
Zane grabbed the carving knife off the table. Straff looked up from his meal, then flinched just slightly as Zane sliced the flesh of his own arm. He cut a long gash into the top of his forearm, drawing blood. The pain helped him resist the voice.
Straff watched for a moment, then waved for a servant to bring Zane a towel so he wouldn’t get blood on the rug.
“You need to get her to use atium again,” Straff said. “Elend may have been able to gather one or two beads. We’ll only know the truth if she runs out.” He paused, turning back to his meal. “Actually, what you need to do is get her to tell you where the stash is hidden, if they even have it.”
The Mistborn Trilogy Page 91