The Hero of Ages m-3

by Brandon Sanderson

  Elend smiled, recognizing the reference. Trentison's Supplying in Scale. A few years earlier, he would have agreed with Yomen, and the two would probably have spent the afternoon discussing the philosophy of leadership in Yomen's palace. However, Elend had learned things in the last few years that he simply hadn't been able to get from his studies.

  Unfortunately, that meant he really couldn't explain them to Yomen-particularly not in the time they had. So, instead, he nodded down the street. "We can move on to the infirmary now, if you wish, Lord Yomen."

  Yomen nodded, and the two turned toward another section of the city. The obligator had a no-nonsense approach to just about everything. Problems should be dealt with quickly and directly. He had a good mind, despite his fondness for making snap judgments.

  As they walked, Elend was careful to keep an eye out for soldiers-on duty or off-in the streets. He nodded to their salutes, met their eyes. Many were working to repair the damages caused by the increasingly powerful earthquakes. Perhaps it was just in Elend's mind, but it seemed that the soldiers walked a little taller after he passed.

  Yomen frowned slightly as he watched Elend do this. The obligator still wore the robes of his station, despite the little bead of atium at his brow that he used to mark his kingship. The tattoos on the man's forehead almost seemed to curl toward the bead, as if they had been designed with it in mind.

  "You don't know much about leading soldiers, do you, Yomen?" Elend asked.

  The obligator raised an eyebrow. "I know more than you ever will about tactics, supply lines, and the running of armies between distinct points."

  "Oh?" Elend said lightly. "So, you've read Bennitson's Armies in Motion, have you?" The "distinct points" line was a dead giveaway.

  Yomen's frown deepened.

  "One thing that we scholars tend to forget about, Yomen, is the impact emotion can have on a battle. It isn't just about food, shoes, and clean water, necessary as those are. It's about hope, courage, and the will to live. Soldiers need to know that their leader will be in the fight-if not killing enemies, then directing things personally from behind the lines. They can't think of him as an abstract force up on a tower somewhere, watching out a window and pondering the depths of the universe."

  Yomen fell silent as they walked through streets that, despite being cleaned of ash, had a forlorn cast to them. Most of the people had retreated to the back portions of the city, where the koloss would go last, if they broke through. They were camping outside, since buildings were unsafe in the quakes.

  "You are an. . interesting man, Elend Venture," Yomen finally said.

  "I'm a bastard," Elend said.

  Yomen raised an eyebrow.

  "In composition, not in temperament or by birth," Elend said with a smile. "I'm an amalgamation of what I've needed to be. Part scholar, part rebel, part nobleman, part Mistborn, and part soldier. Sometimes, I don't even know myself. I had a devil of a time getting all those pieces to work together. And, just when I'm starting to get it figured out, the world up and ends on me. Ah, here we are."

  Yomen's infirmary was a converted Ministry building-which, in Elend's opinion, showed that Yomen was willing to be flexible. His religious buildings weren't so sacred to him that he couldn't acknowledge that they were the best facilities for taking care of the sick and wounded. Inside, they found physicians tending those who had survived the initial clash with the koloss. Yomen bustled off to speak with the infirmary bureaucrats-apparently, he was worried about the number of infections that the men had suffered. Elend walked over to the section with the most serious cases, and began visiting them, offering encouragement.

  It was tough work, looking at the soldiers who had suffered because of his foolishness. How could he have missed seeing that Ruin could take the koloss back? It made so much sense. And yet, Ruin had played its hand well-it had misled Elend, making him think that the Inquisitors were controlling the koloss. Making him feel the koloss could be counted on.

  What would have happened, he thought, if I'd attacked this city with them as originally planned? Ruin would have ransacked Fadrex, slaughtering everyone inside, and then turned the koloss on Elend's soldiers. Now the fortifications defended by Elend and Yomen's men had given Ruin enough pause to make it build up its forces before attacking.

  I have doomed this city, Elend thought, sitting beside the bed of a man who had lost his arm to a koloss blade.

  It frustrated him. He knew he'd made the right decision. And, in truth, he'd rather be inside the city-almost certainly doomed-than be outside besieging it, and winning. For he knew that the winning side wasn't always the right side.

  Still, it came back to his continuing frustration at his inability to protect his people. And, despite Yomen's rule of Fadrex, Elend considered its people to be his people. He'd taken the Lord Ruler's throne, named himself emperor. The entirety of the Final Empire was his to care for. What good was a ruler who couldn't even protect one city, let alone an empire full of them?

  A disturbance at the front of the infirmary room caught his attention. He cast aside his dark thoughts, then bid farewell to the soldier. He rushed to the front of the hospital, where Yomen had already appeared to see what the ruckus was about. A woman stood holding a young boy, who was shaking uncontrollably with the fits.

  One of the physicians rushed forward, taking the boy. "Mistsickness?" he asked.

  The woman, weeping, nodded. "I kept him inside until today. I knew! I knew that it wanted him! Oh, please. ."

  Yomen shook his head as the physician took the boy to a bed. "You should have listened to me, woman," he said firmly. "Everyone in the city was to have been exposed to the mists. Now your son will take a bed that we may need for wounded soldiers."

  The woman slumped down, still crying. Yomen sighed, though Elend could see the concern in the man's eyes. Yomen was not a heartless man, just a pragmatic one. In addition, his words made sense. It was no use hiding someone inside all of their lives, just because of the possibility that they might fall to the mists.

  Fall to the mists. . Elend thought idly, glancing at the boy in bed. He had stopped convulsing, though his face was twisted in an expression of pain. It looked like he hurt so much. Elend had only hurt that much once in his life.

  We never did figure out what this mistsickness was all about, he thought. The mist spirit had never returned to him. But, perhaps Yomen knew something.

  "Yomen," he said, walking up to the man, distracting him from his discussion with the surgeons. "Did any of your people ever figure out the reason for the mist-sickness?"

  "Reason?" Yomen asked. "Does there need to be a reason for a sickness?"

  "There does for one this strange," Elend said. "Did you realize that it strikes down exactly sixteen percent of the population? Sixteen percent-to the man."

  Instead of being surprised, Yomen just shrugged. "Makes sense."

  "Sense?" Elend asked.

  "Sixteen is a powerful number, Venture," Yomen said, looking over some reports. "It was the number of days it took the Lord Ruler to reach the Well of Ascension, for instance. It figures prominently in Church doctrine."

  Of course, Elend thought. Yomen wouldn't be surprised to find order in nature-he believes in a god who ordered that nature.

  "Sixteen. ." Elend said, glancing at the sick boy.

  "The number of original Inquisitors," Yomen said. "The number of Precepts in each Canton charter. The number of Allomantic metals. The-"

  "Wait," Elend said, looking up. "What?"

  "Allomantic metals," Yomen said.

  "There are only fourteen of those."

  Yomen shook his head. "Fourteen we know of, assuming your lady was right about the metal paired to aluminum. However, fourteen is not a number of power. Allomantic metals come in sets of two, with groupings of four. It seems likely that there are two more we haven't discovered, bringing the number to sixteen. Two by two by two by two. Four physical metals, four mental metals, four enhancement metals, and four tempor
al metals."

  Sixteen metals. .

  Elend glanced at the boy again. Pain. Elend had known such pain once-the day his father had ordered him beaten. Beaten to give him such pain that he thought he might die. Beaten to bring his body to a point near death, so that he would Snap.

  Beaten to discover if he was an Allomancer.

  Lord Ruler! Elend thought with shock. He dashed away from Yomen, pushing back into the soldiers' section of the infirmary.

  "Who here was taken by the mists?" Elend demanded.

  The wounded regarded him with quizzical looks.

  "Did any of you get sick?" Elend asked. "When I made you stand out in the mists? Please, I must know!"

  Slowly, the man with one arm raised his remaining hand. "I was taken, my lord. I'm sorry. This wound is probably punishment for-"

  Elend cut the man off, rushing forward, pulling out his spare metal vial. "Drink this," he commanded.

  The man paused, then did as asked. Elend knelt beside the bed eagerly, waiting. His heart pounded in his chest. "Well?" he finally asked.

  "Well. . what, my lord?" the soldier asked.

  "Do you feel anything?" Elend asked.

  The soldier shrugged. "Tired, my lord?"

  Elend closed his eyes, sighing. It was a silly-

  "Well, that's odd," the soldier suddenly said.

  Elend snapped his eyes open.

  "Yes," the soldier said, looking a bit distracted. "I. . I don't know what to make of that."

  "Burn it," Elend said, turning on his bronze. "Your body knows how, if you let it."

  The soldier's frown deepened, and he cocked his head. Then, he began to thump with Allomantic power.

  Elend closed his eyes again, exhaling softly.

  Yomen was walking up behind Elend. "What is this?"

  "The mists were never our enemy, Yomen," Elend said, eyes still closed. "They were just trying to help."

  "Help? Help how? What are you talking about?"

  Elend opened his eyes, turning. "They weren't killing us, Yomen. They weren't making us sick. They were Snapping us. Bringing us power. Making us able to fight."

  "My lord!" a voice suddenly called. Elend turned as a frazzled soldier stumbled into the room. "My lords! The koloss are attacking! They're charging the city!"

  Elend felt a start. Ruin. It knows what I just discovered-it knows it needs to attack now, rather than wait for more troops.

  Because I know the secret!

  "Yomen, gather every bit of powdered metal you can find in this city!" Elend yelled. "Pewter, tin, steel, and iron! Get it to anyone who has been stricken by the mists! Make them drink it down!"

  "Why?" Yomen said, still confused.

  Elend turned, smiling. "Because they are now Allomancers. This city isn't going to fall as easily as everyone assumed. If you need me, I'll be on the front lines!"

  There is something special about the number sixteen. For one thing, it was Preservation's sign to mankind.

  Preservation knew, even before he imprisoned Ruin, that he wouldn't be able to communicate with humankind once he diminished himself. And so, he left clues-clues that couldn't be altered by Ruin. Clues that related back to the fundamental laws of the universe. The number was meant to be proof that something unnatural was happening, and that there was help to be found.

  It may have taken us long to figure this out, but when we eventually did understand the clue-late though it was-it provided a much-needed boost.

  As for the other aspects of the number. . well, even I am still investigating that. Suffice it to say that it has great ramifications regarding how the world, and the universe itself, works.

  71

  Sazed tapped his pen against the metal paper, frowning slightly. "Very little of this last chunk is different from what I knew before," he said. "Ruin changed small things-perhaps to keep me from noticing the alterations. It's obvious that he wanted to make me realize that Vin was the Hero of Ages."

  "He wanted her to release him," said Haddek, leader of the First Generation. His companions nodded.

  "Perhaps she was never the Hero," one of the others offered.

  Sazed shook his head. "I believe that she is. These prophecies still refer to her-even the unaltered ones that you have told me. They talk of one who is separate from the Terris people, a king of men, a rebel caught between two worlds. Ruin just emphasized that Vin was the one, since he wanted her to come and free him."

  "We always assumed that the Hero would be a man," Haddek said in his wheezing voice.

  "So did everyone else," Sazed said. "But, you said yourself that all the prophecies use gender-neutral pronouns. That had to be intentional-one does not use such language in old Terris by accident. The neutral case was chosen so that we wouldn't know whether the Hero was male or female."

  Several of the ancient Terrismen nodded. They worked by the quiet blue light of the glowing stones, still sitting in the chamber with the metal walls-which, from what Sazed had been able to gather, was something of a holy place for the kandra.

  He tapped his pen, frowning. What was bothering him? They say I will hold the future of the entire world on my arms. . Alendi's words, from his logbook written so long ago. The words of the First Generation confirmed that was true.

  There was still something for Vin to do. Yet, the power at the Well of Ascension was gone. Used up. How could she fight without it? Sazed looked up at his audience of ancient kandra. "What was the power at the Well of Ascension, anyway?"

  "Even we are not certain of that, young one," Haddek said. "By the time we lived as men, our gods had already passed from this world, leaving the Terris with only the hope of the Hero."

  "Tell me of this thing," Sazed said, leaning forward. "How did your gods pass from this world?"

  "Ruin and Preservation," said one of the others. "They created our world, and our people."

  "Neither could create alone," Haddek said. "No, they could not. For, to preserve something is not to create it-and neither can you create through destruction only."

  It was a common theme in mythology-Sazed had read it in dozens of the religions he'd studied. The world being created out of a clash between two forces, sometimes rendered as chaos and order, sometimes named destruction and protection. That bothered him a little bit. He was hoping to discover something new in the things men were telling him.

  And yet. . just because something was common, did that make it false? Or, could all of those mythologies have a shared, and true, root?

  "They created the world," Sazed said. "Then left?"

  "Not immediately," Haddek said. "But, here is the trick, young one. They had a deal, those two. Preservation wanted to create men-to create life capable of emotion. He obtained a promise from Ruin to help make men."

  "But at a cost," one of the others whispered.

  "What cost?" Sazed asked.

  "That Ruin could one day be allowed destroy the world," Haddek replied.

  The circular chamber fell silent.

  "Hence the betrayal," Haddek said. "Preservation gave his life to imprison Ruin, to keep him from destroying the world."

  Another common mythological theme-the martyr god. It was one that Sazed himself had witnessed in the birth of the Church of the Survivor.

  Yet. . this time it's my own religion, he thought. He frowned, leaning back, trying to decide how he felt. For some reason, he had assumed that the truth would be different. The scholarly side of him argued with his desire for belief. How could he believe in something so filled with mythological cliches?

  He'd come all this way, believing that he'd been given one last chance to find the truth. Yet, now that he studied it, he was finding that it was shockingly similar to religions he had rejected as false.

  "You seem disturbed, child," Haddek said. "Are you that worried about the things we say?"

  "I apologize," Sazed said. "This is a personal problem, not related to the fate of the Hero of Ages."

  "Please, speak," one of the others said.<
br />
  "It is complicated," Sazed said. "For some time now, I have been searching through the religions of mankind, trying to ascertain which of their teachings were true. I had begun to despair that I would ever find a religion that offered the answers I sought. Then, I learned that my own religion still existed, protected by the kandra. I came here, hoping to find the truth."

  "This is the truth," one of the kandra said.

  "That's what every religion teaches," Sazed said, frustration mounting. "Yet, in each of them I find inconsistencies, logical leaps, and demands of faith I find impossible to accept.

  "It sounds to me, young one," Haddek said, "that you're searching for something that cannot be found."

  "The truth?" Sazed said.

  "No," Haddek replied. "A religion that requires no faith of its believers."

  Another of the kandra elders nodded. "We follow the Father and the First Contract, but our faith is not in him. It's in. . something higher. We trust that Preservation planned for this day, and that his desire to protect will prove more powerful than Ruin's desire to destroy."

  "But you don't know," Sazed said. "You are offered proof only once you believe, but if you believe, you can find proof in anything. It is a logical conundrum."

  "Faith isn't about logic, son," Haddek said. "Perhaps that's your problem. You cannot 'disprove' the things you study, any more than we can prove to you that the Hero will save us. We simply must believe it, and accept the things Preservation has taught us."

  It wasn't enough for Sazed. However, for the moment, he decided to move on. He didn't have all the facts about the Terris religion yet. Perhaps once he had them, he would be able to sort this all out.

  "You spoke of the prison of Ruin," Sazed said. "Tell me how this relates to the power that Lady Vin used."

  "Gods don't have bodies like those of men," Haddek said. "They are. . forces. Powers. Preservation's mind passed, but he left his power behind."