The Lost Metal (Mistborn, #7)

by Brandon Sanderson

Moonlight dug something from her sack, a little device that she read some numbers from. “If I ask, give me the distance twenty-seven sixty-three, inclination twelve degrees. And show me this map.” She held out a notebook. “I don’t have time to explain why.”

She tapped Marasi on the forehead, then drew some symbols in the air with one hand. A second later a duplicate of Marasi appeared, made with some of Moonlight’s power. It started moving, though when Marasi tried to touch it, her fingers passed right through. That made it even more unnerving.

“Trell.” “Your sister becomes Trell,” the thing whispered. “The name and mythology I prepared for her to adopt. But she has not achieved it yet. And I am not Trell. Rare is it that I speak to one directly as I do you.” “Autonomy,” he whispered.

All this time she’d assumed the pictures of ash falling, the strange moving image made with the models above, was a part of a plot to threaten the outside world. But no. The hoax hadn’t been planned to be used in the future; it had already been perpetrated. On these people. Rusts. They thought the world had been destroyed. And that they had been protected from it. “How long,” Marasi whispered, “have you been down here?” “Seven years now,”

This town—‘Wayfarer,’ as we call it—is about five years old.”

“It wasn’t completely random,” one of the women said. “It was weighted toward women of childbearing age, for obvious reasons. And an emphasis on Allomancers or those from the lines of Allomancers. Again for obvious reasons.”

Regardless, she was now certain that was what the ruse was for. Along with actors sent to reinforce the illusion—who were then taken away “to another cavern,” so that they couldn’t slip up and reveal the truth. As long as none of the actual subjects of the experiment were allowed to leave, no one would ever know. But why? So much work, for what? Except … Allomancers.

“I’m a Rioter, though not even my family knew about my powers. Fialia is a Lurcher. Kessi a Soother.” “I had two Allomancer parents,” the man said, “but I never got any powers myself. The others are similar.” That was the final piece. Marasi knew what was happening. And as she put it together, another revelation struck her. She did know the blonde woman. There was a reason she was familiar. She was Marasi’s distant cousin Armal Harms: a woman who had been kidnapped by Miles Hundredlives and the Vanishers seven years ago, during Wax’s first case in the city after his return.

Wax had been the first to notice that the kidnapped people had a history of Allomancy in their families. They’d thought them all women at first, though a few other mysterious kidnappings during the same time period had proven to be men. Marasi and Wax had searched for these people for years, on and off. They’d worried that the Set had done terrible things to them, but had never imagined anything like this. Locking them all up in a bunker? Convincing them that the world had ended?

Down here, they’d have a literal breeding ground for children likely to be Metalborn—excellent for recruitment, or for creating spikes. It turned her stomach in knots, particularly when she thought to look at the women in the room and noticed that two might be pregnant.

but at least the Set hadn’t started turning them into spikes yet.

A cavern that had been designed as an Allomantic eugenics experiment had now expanded to become a bunker housing the lord mayor’s loyalists. Further experiments with spikes were leading to different innovations.

“Is there …” Marasi said, trying to figure out how to phrase it, “some kind of portal around here? Rusts. I don’t even know what it would look like. A large construction of some sort, maybe? Or an area that is specifically off-limits?”

“You are weapons,” Marasi said. “If we can just get you …” Metals. That was why there weren’t any down here. The Set had imprisoned a large group of people who either had extraordinary abilities, or were likely to give birth to people with them. Telsin and the others knew that unless they were careful, they’d be overpowered by their own captives. Hence the lack of metals and the story of “mutants” who could sense it.

Plus, Wax liked bein’ blatant. And what was more blatant than havin’ a beer in front of the city’s stupid propaganda poster?

“So,” Wax said, leaning back, “you don’t need forgiveness. Because you aren’t the man who killed Durkel. Not anymore. The man who did that, well, he’s dead. Buried beneath six feet of the clay and rock that passes for soil in the Roughs. You haven’t been him for years.”

“What’s any of this for, if people can’t change? If there’s no chance for you, Wayne, there’s no chance for anyone. We might as well shoot a man the first time he does anything wrong, because hey … he’ll never change, so who cares?”

“You mess up a lot less than you fix, Wayne. You can’t deny it. You are a good man.” Wayne fell quiet. Because … because he liked Wax. More, he trusted Wax. Wax was right about things. Could he … be right about this?

“You can’t keep digging up the corpse of who you used to be, Wayne. You can’t keep toting it around. Let him stay buried. Consider who you are, not who you left behind. That’s what I’ve learned these last few years. It’s made all the difference.”

“It’s a mesa. That spire. That’s the mesa.” “What mesa?” “In my ma’s story,” Wayne said, “it all ended at the mesa. The lone peak in the center of a flat landscape.” Wayne eyed his friend to see if he complained they weren’t in that story. Because in this, Wax would be wrong. They were in it—or at least living alongside it. Because Wayne had decided it was so, and that was the way of things. “A mesa, eh?” Wax said, letting one leg slip out over the edge to dangle. “Yeah, I can see that.”

“We just call it the Big Gun,” Wax said. “I’d hoped I wouldn’t need it. It wasn’t built for a lawman. It was built … for a sword.”

You have to stop the Blatant Barms of the world, yes. But if you can create a world where fewer boys grow up alone … well, maybe you’ll have far fewer Blatant Barms to face in the future. Maybe that was what your mother was saying.”

‘You’re meant to be helping people,’ Wayne. ‘It’s what you do.’ ” Wayne cocked his head. “Was that … a quote or somethin’?” “It’s what you said to me seven years ago. When people needed me, but I was too afraid to pick up a gun.” “You remember that?” Wayne said. “The exact things I said?” “Of course I do. Those words changed my life.” Wayne let out a howl of laughter. “Damn, Wax. I just say things! You’re not supposed to actually pay attention to them!” “It was meaningful!”

“Entrone,” she said, “you don’t have to go through with this.” “With what, exactly?” he said. “You’re going to open a portal to let Autonomy’s army begin an invasion of our world. I know the plan.”

“Because if I don’t,” he said, “she’ll send them anyway—and then I’ll be one of the ones who gets killed. We can’t fight them. They’ll annihilate our forces.”

“It takes special circumstances to create one of these portals,” he said. “Even for her. Can’t just be anywhere, or anytime.” He turned, looking over his shoulder. “The timing gave us a deadline.”

“The location …” he said, turning back. “I think it’s because of those people, oddly. Such a large collection of Metalborn. And we were required to bring in a strange power, a glowing light. That’s part of the key.”

“Are you a Survivorist, constable?” he asked. “Yes,” she said. “Then you know our prime tenet,” he said, looking up and meeting her eyes. “The one we’re taught from childhood?” “Survive,” she whispered. He nodded. “Not like this,” she said. “Not at the expense of others. Kelsier didn’t give up without a fight. He didn’t simply go with what the Lord Ruler demanded. He taught us to survive despite obstacles. Not to let ourselves be slowly crushed so we could gain a minute or two of extra breath.”

White, with a mother-of-pearl sheen. Yes. It was like the pure Investiture from Moonlight’s jars.

“I’m a god now, little bastard,” he said to her. “What strength do you have to stand against me? Your Allomancy? Pathetic. Your weapons? Laughable. You have no power to threaten me.”

A Rioting, with the power of a thousand Allomancers, hit their emotions like a physical wave of force.

but it seemed that she’d been granted exceptional abilities—like when Vin had drawn in the mists, as recorded in scripture. Rusts. Could that glowing light be the body of a god, just like the mists had been?

Radiant light had been poured into a pool twenty feet wide, and it was beginning to churn. Glowing brightly. Lighting the walls a ghostly white. She didn’t have to think hard to grasp the mythological implications of this place. Rusts. That was raw, concentrated power. A single jar had given TwinSoul the power to create a stone body twelve feet tall, a second had transformed Moonlight into another person, and a third had given Armal the power to Riot emotions like the Lord Ruler himself. This pool had to hold thousands of jars’ worth of the power.

she was close enough that she saw them, in a place with a dark sky and misty ground. Thousands of inhuman soldiers with golden skin and glowing red eyes. Living statues. They carried rifles of an advanced design, and their stares seemed to bore holes in her mind. The men of gold and red had arrived. Bearers of the final metal, Miles had called them. Destroyers.

“I need every Allomancer in this cavern gathered here, right now.” “Why?” Armal said, walking up to her. “There’s a well of power in the room nearby, and it’s opening a portal to something terrible,” Marasi said. “We’re going to stop it the old-fashioned way. By burning up all of the power with our abilities.”

“The Ascendant Warrior did it,” Wayne grumbled. “When?” “Right before killin’ the Lord Ruler.” “Since when have you known that sort of thing?”

“Assassinating the Lord Ruler?” Wax asked. “Isn’t that a little violent for a children’s book?” “Mate,” Wayne said, “it ain’t violence if it’s religion. Don’t you know anythin’?”

“Damn,” Wayne said as the gunfire tapered off. “Those are soldiers, mate. I came down here to the Basin all those years ago ’cuz of a cute little case involvin’ train cars what got robbed in a funny way. How in Ruin’s own name did I end up getting mixed up with dark gods, armies, bombs destroyin’ cities, and … and ghosts, Wax. We still ain’t talked about the ghosts.”

“Can you keep their attention while I try to flank them?” Wayne smiled. “Scary Tree? We could do Scary Tree!” “Do you have enough health stored for Scary Tree?” “Mate, I don’t need health for Scary Tree,” Wayne said. “Just you watch.”

“Sorry for the bullet holes.” “A few holes won’t …” Wax said, then noticed—in the weak light of the room’s flickering ceiling light—that there had to be at least sixteen holes in it, even in some of the tassels. “How did you not get shot?” “By not bein’ where the bullets was,” Wayne said.

“Stay behind. Follow once I’m done. But don’t engage. It’s time for Harmony’s Sword to do his job.”

Once, Wax had run from his calling. He’d seen a duty that required him to not just find answers, not just solve problems, but to become something terrible. Something that Harmony—manacled by the powers of Preservation—couldn’t do himself. Tonight Waxillium embraced that duty. He became destruction incarnate. For to worship Harmony was not only to worship Preservation—it was also to worship Ruin, with all that implied.

But they’d never fought Waxillium Ladrian.

He couldn’t stop. He couldn’t afford to stop. If he did, life ended. He fought with grenade, bullet, and steel. He fought as the sword, put where it needed to be. For all he hated that it was necessary.

“Did you know this was coming?” Wax whispered to Harmony. “Is this ultimately why you brought me back to Elendel? Was this why you had Lessie watch me? Did you always know?” There was no answer, of course. Wax wasn’t pierced by the right metal currently, and couldn’t commune with God. Still, he felt as if he could feel Harmony trying to push through, trying to see. Fighting Trell’s influence. “Don’t ask me to do this again,” Wax whispered, turning away from the carnage below. “This wasn’t an adventure. It was a massacre. I’ll finish the job, but don’t ask me again. Find yourself another sword. You don’t know how this feels.”

Sometimes you needed what he’d done. You needed a sword. But Wayne figured sometimes you needed something else. A shield? Or maybe that was too poetic. He didn’t know much about poetry.

Sometimes what you needed was a guy who had been there before.

Then she felt something different. Something emerging. They were coming through. She understood it in a flash—you had to want to come through the portal. To command it to let you through. They were beginning the process.

used the same mental command to open the portal to them. The movement on the other side stopped.

She was left with one final impression from the other side. Shock. Judging by how much energy she’d put into those grenades,