2

Immortality proved to be far more frustrating than Kelsier had anticipated.

Of course, he didn’t know if he was truly immortal or not. He didn’t have a heartbeat—which was only unnerving when he noticed it—and didn’t need to breathe. But who could say if his soul aged or not in this place?

In the hours following his survival, Kelsier inspected his new home. God was right, it was a prison. The pool he was in grew deep at the center point, and was filled with liquid light that seemed a reflection of something more . . . potent on the other side.

Fortunately, though the Well was not wide, only the very center was deeper than he was tall. He could stay around the perimeters and only be in the light up to his waist. It was thin, thinner than water, and easy to move through.

He could also step out of this pool and its attached pillar of light, settling onto the rocky side. Everything in this cavern was made of mist, though the edges of the Well . . . He seemed to see the stone better here, more fully. It appeared to have some actual color to it. As if this place were part spirit, like him.

He could sit on the edge of the Well, legs dangling into the light. But if he tried to walk too far from the Well, misty wisps of that same power trailed him and held him back, like chains. They wouldn’t let him get more than a few feet from the pool. He tried straining, pushing, dashing and throwing himself out, but nothing worked. He always pulled up sharply once he got a few feet away.

After several hours of trying to break free, Kelsier settled down on the side of the Well, feeling . . . exhausted? Was that even the right word? He had no body, and felt no traditional signs of tiredness. No headache, no strained muscles. But he was fatigued. Worn out like an old banner allowed to flap in the wind through too many rainstorms.

Forced to relax, he took stock of what little he could make out of his surroundings. Fuzz was gone; the god had been distracted by something a short time after Kelsier’s Preservation, and had vanished. That left Kelsier with a cavern made of shadows, the glowing pool itself, and some pillars extending through the chamber. At the other end, he saw the glow of bits of metal, though he couldn’t figure out what they were.

This was the sum of his existence. Had he just locked himself away in this little prison for eternity? It seemed an ultimate irony to him that he might have managed to cheat death, only to find himself suffering a fate far worse.

What would happen to his mind if he spent a few decades in here? A few centuries?

He sat on the rim of the Well, and tried to distract himself by thinking about his friends. He’d trusted in his plans at the moment of his death, but now he saw so many holes in his plot to inspire a rebellion. What if the skaa didn’t rise up? What if the stockpiles he’d prepared weren’t enough?

Even if that all worked, so much would ride upon the shoulders of some very ill-prepared men. And one remarkable young woman.

Lights drew his attention, and he leaped to his feet, eager for any distraction. A group of figures, outlined as glowing souls, had entered this room in the world of the living. There was something odd about them. Their eyes . . .

Inquisitors.

Kelsier refused to flinch, though by every instinct he dreaded these creatures. He had bested one of their champions. He would fear them no longer. Instead, he paced his confines, trying to discern what the three Inquisitors were lugging toward him. Something large and heavy, but it didn’t glow at all.

A body, Kelsier realized. Headless.

Was this the one he’d killed? Yes, it must be. Another Inquisitor was reverently carrying the dead one’s spikes, a whole pile of them, all placed together inside a large jar of liquid. Kelsier squinted at it, taking a single step out of his prison, trying to determine what he was seeing.

“Blood,” Fuzz said, suddenly standing nearby. “They store the spikes in blood until they can be used again. In that way, they can prevent the spikes from losing their effectiveness.”

“Huh,” Kelsier said, stepping to the side as the Inquisitors tossed the body into the Well, then dropped in the head. Both evaporated. “Do they do this often?”

“Each time one of their number dies,” Fuzz said. “I doubt they even know what they are doing. Tossing a dead body into that pool is beyond meaningless.”

The Inquisitors retreated with the spikes of the fallen. Judging by their slumped forms, the four creatures were exhausted.

“My plan,” Kelsier said, looking to Fuzz. “How is it going? My crew should have discovered the warehouse by now. The people of the city . . . did it work? Are the skaa angry?”

“Hmmm?” Fuzz asked.

“The revolution, the plan,” Kelsier said, stepping toward him. God shifted backward, getting just beyond where Kelsier would be able to reach, hand going to the knife at his belt. Perhaps that punch earlier had been ill-advised. “Fuzz, listen. You have to go nudge them. We’ll never have a better chance of overthrowing him.”

“The plan . . .” Fuzz said. He unraveled for a moment, before returning. “Yes, there was a plan. I . . . remember I had a plan. When I was smarter . . .”

“The plan,” Kelsier said, “is to get the skaa to revolt. It won’t matter how powerful the Lord Ruler is, won’t matter if he’s immortal, once we toss him in chains and lock him away.”

Fuzz nodded, distracted.

“Fuzz?”

He shook, glancing toward Kelsier, and the sides of his head unraveled slowly—like a fraying rug, each thread seeping away and vanishing into nothing. “He’s killing me, you know. He wants me gone before the next cycle, though . . . perhaps I can hold out. You hear me, Ruin! I’m not dead yet. Still . . . still here . . .”

Hell, Kelsier thought, cold. God is going insane.

Fuzz started pacing. “I know you’re listening, changing what I write, what I have written. You make our religion all about you. They hardly remember the truth any longer. Subtle as always, you worm.”

“Fuzz,” Kelsier said. “Could you just go—”

“I needed a sign,” Fuzz whispered, stopping near Kelsier. “Something he couldn’t change. A sign of the weapon I’d buried. The boiling point of water, I think. Maybe its freezing point? But what if the units change over the years? I needed something that would be remembered always. Something they’ll immediately recognize.” He leaned in. “Sixteen.”

“Six . . . teen?” Kelsier said.

“Sixteen.” Fuzz grinned. “Clever, don’t you think?”

“Because it means . . .”

“The number of metals,” Fuzz said. “In Allomancy.”

“There are ten. Eleven, if you count the one I discovered.”

“No! No, no, that’s stupid. Sixteen. It’s the perfect number. They’ll see. They have to see.” Fuzz started pacing again, and his head returned—mostly—to its earlier state.

Kelsier sat down on the rim of his prison. God’s actions were far more erratic than they had been earlier. Had something changed, or—like a human with a mental disease—was God simply better at some times than he was at others?

Fuzz looked up abruptly. He winced, turning his eyes toward the ceiling, as if it were going to collapse on him. He opened his mouth, jaw working, but made no sound.

“What . . .” he finally said. “What have you done?”

Kelsier stood up in his prison.

“What have you done?” Fuzz screamed.

Kelsier smiled. “Hope,” he said softly. “I have hoped.”

“He was perfect,” Fuzz said. “He was . . . the only one of you . . . that . . .” He spun suddenly, gazing down the shadowy room beyond Kelsier’s prison.

Someone stood at the other end. A tall, commanding figure, not made of light. Familiar clothing, of both white and black, contrasting with itself.

The Lord Ruler. His spirit, at least.

Kelsier stepped up onto the rim of stone around the pool and waited as the Lord Ruler strode toward the light of the Well. He stopped in place when he noticed Kelsier.

“I killed you,” the Lord Ruler said. “Twice. Yet you live.”

“Yes. We’re all aware of how strikingly incompetent you are. I’m glad you’re beginning to see it for yourself. That’s the first step toward change.”

The Lord Ruler sniffed and looked around at the chamber, with its diaphanous walls. His eyes passed over Fuzz, but he didn’t give the god much consideration.

Kelsier exulted. She’d done it. She’d actually done it. How? What secret had he missed?

“That grin,” the Lord Ruler said to Kelsier, “is insufferable. I did kill you.”

“I returned the favor.”

“You didn’t kill me, Survivor.”

“I forged the blade that did.”

Fuzz cleared his throat. “It is my duty to be with you as you transition. Don’t be worried, or—”

“Be silent,” the Lord Ruler said, inspecting Kelsier’s prison. “Do you know what you’ve done, Survivor?”

“I’ve won.”

“You’ve brought Ruin upon the world. You are a pawn. So proud, like a soldier on the battlefield, confident he controls his own destiny—while ignoring the thousands upon thousands in his rank.” He shook his head. “Only a year left. So close. I would have again ransomed this undeserving planet.”

“This is just . . .” Fuzz swallowed. “This is an in-between step. After death and before the Somewhere Else. Where souls must go. Where yours must go, Rashek.”

Rashek? Kelsier looked again at the Lord Ruler. You could not tell a Terrisman by skin tone; that was a mistake many people made. Some Terris were dark, others light. Still, he would have thought . . .

The room filled with furs. This man, in the cold.

Idiot. That was what it meant, of course.

“It was all a lie,” Kelsier said. “A trick. Your fabled immortality? Your healing? Feruchemy. But how did you become an Allomancer?”

The Lord Ruler stepped right up to the pillar of light that rose from the prison, and the two stared at one another. As they had on that square above when alive.

Then the Lord Ruler stuck his hand into the light.

Kelsier set his jaw and pictured sudden, horrifying images of spending an eternity trapped with the man who had murdered Mare. The Lord Ruler pulled his hand out, however, trailing light like molasses. He turned his hand over, inspecting the glow, which eventually faded.

“So now what?” Kelsier asked. “You remain here?”

“Here?” The Lord Ruler laughed. “With an impotent mouse and a half-blooded rat? Please.”

He closed his eyes, then he stretched toward that point that defied geometry. He faded, then finally vanished.

Kelsier gaped. “He left?”

“To the Somewhere Else,” Fuzz said, sitting down. “I should not have been so hopeful. Everything passes, nothing is eternal. That is what Ati always claimed. . . .”

“He didn’t have to leave,” Kelsier said. “He could have remained. Could have survived!”

“I told you, by this point rational people want to move on.” Fuzz vanished.

Kelsier remained standing there, at the edge of his prison, the glowing pool tossing his shadow across the floor. He stared into the misty room with its columns, waiting for something, though he wasn’t certain what. Confirmation, celebration, a change of some sort.

Nothing. Nobody came, not even the Inquisitors. How had the revolution gone? Were the skaa now rulers of society? He would have liked to see the deaths of the noble ranks, treated—in turn—as they had treated their slaves.

He received no confirmation, no sign, of what was happening above. They didn’t know about the Well, obviously. All Kelsier could do was settle down.

And wait.