“The flames,” Spook croaked. “We have to put out the fires. The city is too dry; it has too much wood. It will burn, with everyone in it.”
Sazed looked grave. “There is no way. We must get out! This riot will destroy us.”
Spook glanced to the side. Beldre was kneeling beside her brother. She’d bound his wound, and then made a makeshift sling for his arm. Quellion glanced at Spook, looking dazed. As if he’d just awoken from a dream.
Spook stumbled to his feet. “We won’t abandon the city, Sazed.”
“But—”
“No!” Spook said. “I ran from Luthadel and left Clubs to die. I will not run again! We can stop the flames. We just need water.”
Sazed paused.
“Water,” Beldre said, standing.
“The canals will fill soon,” Spook said. “We can organize fire brigades—use the flood to stop the flames.”
Beldre glanced down. “There will be no flood, Spook. The guards you left . . . I attacked them with coins.”
Spook felt a chill. “Dead?”
She shook her head, hair disheveled, her face scratched. “I don’t know,” she said quietly. “I didn’t look.”
“The waters have not come yet,” Sazed said. “They . . . should have been released by now.”
“Then we will bring them!” Spook snapped. He spun at Quellion, then stumbled, feeling dizzy. “You!” he said, pointing at the Citizen. “You would be king of this city? Well, lead this people, then. Get control of them and prepare them to put out the fires.”
“I can’t,” Quellion said. “They’ll kill me for what I’ve done.”
Spook wobbled, light-headed. He steadied himself against a beam, holding his head. Beldre took a step toward him.
Spook looked up, meeting Quellion’s eyes. The fires of the city were so bright that his flared tin made it difficult to see. Yet, he dared not release the metal—only the power of noise, heat, and pain was keeping him conscious.
“You will go to them,” Spook said. “I don’t give a damn if they rip you apart, Quellion. You’re going to try to save this city. If you don’t, I’ll kill you myself. Do you understand?”
The Citizen froze, then nodded.
“Sazed,” Spook said, “take him to Breeze and Allrianne. I’m going to the cache. I’ll bring the floodwaters to the canals, one way or another. Have Breeze and the others form fire brigades to douse the flames as soon as there is water.”
Sazed nodded. “It is a good plan. But Goradel will lead the Citizen. I am coming with you.”
Spook nodded wearily. Then, as Sazed moved off to get the guard captain—who had apparently established a defensive perimeter around the square—Spook climbed from the stage and forced himself to begin moving toward the cache.
Soon, he noticed someone catch up to him. Then, after a few moments, that person passed him and ran on. Part of his mind knew it was a good thing that Sazed had decided to move on—the Terrisman had created the mechanism that would flood the city. He would throw the lever. Spook wasn’t needed.
Keep moving.
He did, walking on, as if each step were in atonement for what he had done to the city. After a short time, he realized that someone was at his side, tying a bandage on his arm.
He blinked. “Beldre?”
“I betrayed you,” she said, looking down. “But, I didn’t have a choice. I couldn’t let you kill him. I . . .”
“You did the right thing,” Spook said. “Something . . . something was interfering, Beldre. It had your brother. It almost had me. I don’t know. We have to keep walking, though. The lair is close. Just up the ramp.”
She supported him as they walked. Spook smelled the smoke before he got there. He saw the light, and felt the heat. He and Beldre climbed up to the top of the ramp, practically crawling, for she was nearly as battered as he was. However, Spook knew what he would find.
The Ministry building, like so much of the town, was burning. Sazed stood before it, hand raised before his eyes. To Spook’s overenhanced senses, the brilliance of the flames was so great that he had to look away. The heat made him feel as if he were standing just inches from the sun.
Sazed tried to get closer to the building, but was forced back. He turned toward Spook, shielding his face. “It’s too hot!” he said. “We need to find some water, or perhaps some sand. Put out the fire before we can get below.”
“Too late . . .” Spook whispered. “It will take too long.”
Beldre turned, looking over her city. To Spook’s eyes, smoke seemed to twist and rise everywhere in the bright sky, reaching up, as if to meet the falling ash.
He set his jaw, then stumbled forward, toward the fire.
“Spook!” she cried out. But, she needn’t have worried. The flames were too hot. The pain was so strong that he had to pull back before he’d crossed even half the distance. He stumbled away, joining Beldre and Sazed, gasping quietly, blinking tears. His heightened senses made it even more difficult for him to approach the flames.
“There is nothing we can do here,” Sazed said. “We must gather crews and come back.”
“I’ve failed,” Spook whispered.
“No more than any of us,” Sazed said. “This is my fault. The emperor put me in command.”
“We were supposed to bring security to the city,” Spook said. “Not destruction. I should be able to stop those fires. But, it hurts too much.”
Sazed shook his head. “Ah, Lord Spook. You are no god, to command fire at your whim. You are a man, like the rest of us. We’re all just . . . men.”
Spook allowed them to pull him away. Sazed was right, of course. He was just a man. Just Spook. Kelsier had chosen his crew with care. He’d left a note for them, when he died. It had listed the others—Vin, Breeze, Dockson, Clubs, and Ham. He’d spoken of them, of why he’d picked them.
But not Spook. The only one who didn’t fit in.
I named you, Spook. You were my friend.
Isn’t that enough?
Spook froze, forcing the others to stop. Sazed and Beldre looked at him. Spook stared into the night. A night that was far too bright. The fires burned. The smoke was pungent.
“No,” Spook whispered, feeling fully lucid for the first time since the evening’s violence had started. He pulled himself free of Sazed’s grip and ran back toward the burning building.
“Spook!” Two voices yelled in the night.
Spook approached the flames. His breathing grew forced, and his skin grew hot. The fire was bright—consuming. He dashed right for it. Then, at the moment when the pain became too great, he extinguished his tin.
And became numb.
It happened just as it had before, when he had been trapped in the building without any metals. Flaring tin for so long had expanded his senses, but now that he wasn’t burning it at all, those same senses became dull. His entire body grew deadened, lacking feeling or sensation.
He burst through the doorway into the building, flames raining around him.
His body burned. But, he couldn’t feel the flames, and the pain could not drive him back. The fire was bright enough that even his weakened eyes could still see. He dashed forward, ignoring fire, heat, and smoke.
Survivor of the Flames.
He knew the fires were killing him. Yet, he forced himself onward, continuing to move long after the pain should have rendered him unconscious. He reached the room at the back, skidding and sliding down the broken ladder.
The cavern was dark. He stumbled through it, pushing his way past shelves and furniture, making his way along the wall, moving with a desperation that warned him that his time was short. His body wasn’t working right anymore—he had pushed it too far, and he no longer had pewter.
He was glad for the darkness. As he finally stumbled against Sazed’s machine, he knew that he would have been horrified to see what the flames had done to his arms.
Groaning quietly, he felt for and found the lever—or, through numb hands, what he hope
d was the lever. His fingers no longer worked. So, he simply threw his weight against it, moving the gears as required.
Then he slid down to the ground, feeling only cold and dark.
PART FIVE
TRUST
I do not know what went on in the minds of the koloss—what memories they retained, what human emotions they truly still knew. I do know that our discovery of the one creature, who named himself Human, was tremendously fortunate. Without his struggle to become human again, we might never have understood the link between the koloss, Hemalurgy, and the Inquisitors.
Of course, there was another part for him to play. Granted, not large, but still important, all things considered.
59
URTEAU HAD SEEN BETTER DAYS.
Vin certainly did her work here well, TenSoon thought as he padded through the city, shocked at the destruction. About two years ago—before he’d been sent to spy on Vin—he had been Straff Venture’s kandra, and had often visited Urteau. While it had never matched Luthadel’s noble majesty or sprawling poverty, it had been a fine city, worthy of being the seat of a Great House.
Now, a good third of the city was a burned ruin. Those buildings that hadn’t burned down were either abandoned or overcrowded—an odd mixture, in TenSoon’s opinion. Apparently, noble homes were avoided, while skaa buildings were overpacked.
More remarkable, however, were the canals. They had been refilled somehow. TenSoon sat on his haunches, watching the occasional makeshift boat push its way through a canal, displacing the patina of ash that covered the water. Here and there, debris and refuse clogged the waterways, but they were passable in most places.
He rose, shaking his canine head, continuing on his way. He’d stowed the bag with Kelsier’s bones outside, not wanting to look odd carrying a pack on his back.
What had been the purpose of burning the city, then restoring its canals? He would likely have to wait to find the answer. He’d seen no army camped outside; if Vin had been here, she’d already moved on to another location. His goal now was to find what passed for leadership in the remains of the city, then continue on his way, hunting down the Hero of Ages.
As he walked, he heard the people talking—speaking of how they’d managed to survive the fires that had claimed much of the city. They actually seemed cheerful. There was despair, too, but there seemed an inordinate amount of happiness. This was not a city whose people had been conquered.
They feel they defeated the fire, TenSoon thought, making his way along a more crowded street. They don’t see losing a third of the city as a disaster—they see saving two-thirds of it as a miracle.
He followed the flow of traffic toward the center of town, where he finally found the soldiers he’d expected. They were definitely Elend’s, bearing the spear and the scroll on the arms of their uniforms. However, they defended an unlikely location: a Ministry building.
TenSoon sat back on his haunches, cocking his head. The building was obviously a center of operations. People bustled about under the eyes of the watchful soldiers, moving in and out. If he wanted answers, he’d need to get inside. He briefly considered going to fetch Kelsier’s bones from outside the city. However, he discarded that thought. He wasn’t certain if he wanted to deal with the ramifications of making the Survivor appear again. There was another way to get in—equally shocking, perhaps, but far less theologically disturbing.
He padded over to the front of the building and walked up the steps, drawing a few startled looks. As he approached the front doors, one of the guards shouted at him, waving the butt of a spear his direction.
“Here now!” the man said. “This is no place for dogs. Whose hound is this?”
TenSoon sat back on his haunches. “I belong to no man,” he said.
The guard jumped back in shock, and TenSoon got a twisted sense of pleasure. He immediately chided himself. The world was ending, and he went about startling random soldiers. Still, it was an advantage of wearing a dog’s body that he’d never considered. . . .
“Wha . . .” the soldier said, looking around to see if he were the victim of some joke.
“I said,” TenSoon repeated, “that I belong to no man. I am my own master.”
It was a strange concept—the weight of which, undoubtedly, the guard could never grasp. TenSoon, a kandra, was outside of the Homeland without a Contract. As far as he knew, he was the first of his people to do such a thing in seven hundred years. It felt oddly . . . satisfying.
Several people were staring at him now. Other guards had approached, looking to their comrade for an explanation.
TenSoon gambled. “I’ve come from Emperor Venture,” he said. “I bear a message for your leaders here.”
To TenSoon’s satisfaction, several of the other guards jumped. The first one, however—now an old hand when it came to talking dogs—raised a hesitant finger, pointing into the building. “In there.”
“Thank you,” TenSoon said, rising and walking through a now-quiet crowd as he made his way into the Ministry offices. He heard comments about “trick” and “well-trained” behind him, and noticed several guards running past him, faces urgent. He wound his way through groups and lines of people, all ignorant of the odd occurrence at the entrance to the building. At the end of the lines, TenSoon found . . .
Breeze. The Soother sat in a throne-like chair, holding a cup of wine, looking very pleased with himself as he made proclamations and settled disputes. He looked much as he had when TenSoon had served as Vin’s servant. One of the guards stood whispering to Breeze. Both eyed TenSoon as he padded up to the front of the line. The guard paled slightly, but Breeze just leaned forward, smiling.
“So,” he said, tapping his cane lightly against the marble floor. “Were you always a kandra, or did you eat the bones of Vin’s hound recently?”
TenSoon sat. “I was always a kandra.”
Breeze nodded. “I knew there was something odd about you—far too well behaved for a wolfhound.” He smiled, sipping his wine. “Lord Renoux, I presume? It’s been a while.”
“I’m not him, actually,” TenSoon said. “I’m a different kandra. It’s . . . complicated.”
That gave Breeze pause. He eyed TenSoon, and TenSoon felt just a moment of panic. Breeze was a Soother—and, like all Soothers, he held the power to take control of TenSoon’s body. The Secret.
No, TenSoon told himself forcefully. Allomancers are weaker now than they once were. Only with duralumin could they take control of a kandra, and Breeze is only a Misting—he can’t burn duralumin.
“Drinking on the job, Breeze?” TenSoon asked, raising a canine eyebrow.
“Of course,” Breeze said, raising the cup. “What good is being in charge if you can’t set your own working conditions?”
TenSoon snorted. He hadn’t ever really liked Breeze—though perhaps that came from his bias against Soothers. Or, perhaps, his bias against all humans. Regardless, he wasn’t inclined toward small talk. “Where is Vin?” he asked.
Breeze frowned. “I thought you brought a message from her?”
“I lied to the guards,” TenSoon said. “I’ve actually come searching for her. I bring news she needs to hear—news regarding the mists and ash.”
“Well, then, my dear man . . . um . . . I suppose I mean my dear doggie. Anyway, let us retire; you can talk to Sazed. He’s far more useful than I am regarding these sorts of things.”
“. . . and, with Spook barely having survived the ordeal,” said the Terrisman, “I thought it best to let Lord Breeze take command. We set up shop in a different Ministry building—it seemed equipped to be a bureaucratic center—and had Breeze start listening to petitions. He is better at dealing with people than I am, I think, and seems to enjoy taking care of the day-to-day concerns of the citizenry.”
The Terrisman sat in his chair, a portfolio open on the desk before him, a pile of notes beside it. Sazed looked different to TenSoon for some reason that he couldn’t pin down. The Keeper wore the same robes, and ha
d the same Feruchemical bracers on his arms. But there was something missing.
That, however, was the least of TenSoon’s problems.
“Fadrex City?” TenSoon asked, sitting on his own chair. They were in one of the smaller rooms at the Ministry building—one that had once been an obligator’s sleeping quarters. Now, it simply held a desk and chairs, the walls and floor as austere as one might expect for Ministry furnishings.
Sazed nodded. “She and the emperor hoped to find another of these storage caverns there.”
TenSoon slumped. Fadrex was halfway across the empire. Even with the Blessing of Potency, it would take weeks for him to get there. He had a very, very long run ahead of him.
“Might I ask what business you have with Lady Vin, kandra?” Sazed asked.
TenSoon paused. It felt very odd, in a way, to speak so openly with Breeze, and now Sazed. These were men that TenSoon had watched for months while he acted like a dog. They’d never known him, yet he felt as if he knew them.
He knew, for instance, that Sazed was dangerous. The Terrisman was a Keeper—a group that TenSoon and his brethren had been trained to avoid. Keepers were always prying for rumors, legends, and tales. The kandra had many secrets; if the Keepers were ever to discover the riches of kandra culture, it could be disastrous. They’d want to study, ask questions, and record what they found.
TenSoon opened his mouth to say “Nothing.” However, he stopped. Didn’t he want someone to help with kandra culture? Someone who focused on religions, and who—perhaps—knew much of theology? Someone who knew about the legends of the Hero of Ages? Of all the members of the crew other than Vin, TenSoon had held Sazed in the highest regard.
“It has to do with the Hero of Ages,” TenSoon said carefully. “And the advent of the world’s end.”
“Ah,” Sazed said, rising. “Very well then. I shall give you whatever provisions you need. Will you be starting out immediately? Or, will you be staying here to rest for a time?”
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