Shadows of Self

  Wax knelt in the back of the coach, listening while he carefully unwrapped a bundle of black cloth. A lantern hung on the side of the coach, giving him light, but also turning the mists into a bloom of illumination. He could still feel the Soother’s touch from the nearby building, but it was far less pronounced now. He felt almost like himself. That was both good and bad, for there was nothing to hold back his sense of revulsion as he unwrapped the bloody mallet that had been used to pound the spikes into Father Bin.

  “I shouldn’t have looked into the coach,” Chapaou said. “He told me not to look, you know? But I couldn’t help it. So I turned softly and peeked in the coachman’s slot, the one they have so you can see if the person inside is ripping the upholstery or whatnot.

  “I found I hadn’t been carrying a man, but a monster. A mistwraith, with bones and sinew exposed, and a face of stretched muscle and grinning teeth. It looked at me, all smiles, and scrambled up toward the hole. It pressed that exposed eye against the slot, and then it changed. It changed. Skin growing over its face, like mine. A twisted, broken version of me.”

  He started weeping again. Wax unrolled bones from the bundle, the corpse of the Pathian whom Bleeder had imitated in order to kill Father Bin. Bleached, picked clean, and under them a pile of cloth. Pathian robes? Yes, the colors were right.

  “Hands all red…” Chapaou whispered.

  “You ran, after that?” Wax asked, lining up the bones carefully.

  “No, I drove,” Chapaou said. “I whipped the horses forward, bearing that demonspawn in my coach. A driver for Ironeyes himself. What good would it do to run? It had my soul. Harmony … it has my soul.”

  “No,” Wax said. “It is a trickster, a false face, Chapaou. It was a twisted version of yourself, you say?” MeLaan had said that older kandra could often approximate a face without having the right bones, but it was always noticeable.

  “Yeah.” The man huddled down lower in the alleyway. “I know what you think, lawman. I killed that priest tonight, didn’t I? I went mad, and I killed him, and those bloody hands are mine. Shoulda killed myself, jumped off that bridge…”

  “No,” Wax said. “You’ve been taken in by a charlatan, Chapaou. It wasn’t you.”

  The man just whimpered.

  Wax continued, methodically laying out the evidence, though a part of him wondered what good it would do. Did traditional detective work have any place in a fight against a creature like this? How did you fight mythology with a microscope? Harmony … what if he did find a clue? If he chased her down? Could he even defeat something like this?

  He stared at the bones, then shook his head. He would send for a crime-scene team to look this over. He needed to get to the governor’s mansion and check in.

  Wait, he thought, then leaned forward. There, on the hem of the robe. What was that? He shielded the lantern, causing Chapaou to groan and huddle down farther.

  With the lantern dimmed, Wax spotted it better. The corner of the robe’s hem glowed with a soft blue light, easy to miss. Wax reached down, taking a substance off the robe and rubbing it between his fingers. A powder of some sort? What kind of powder gave off its own light, faint though it was?

  “Did you see anything glowing back here, Chapaou?” he asked, turning toward the man. Wax had to unshield the lantern to get him to respond. Even then, the only reply he got was a confused shake of the head.

  “Where did you drive the coach?” Wax asked.

  “Lestib Square,” Chapaou whispered. “Where I’d been told to drop the creature off. Then I squeezed my eyes shut and waited. It … it climbed up to me, as it left. Hands on my shoulders, head beside mine, cheeks touching. I could feel the blood, though it left none staining my shirt. It … it whispered to me, lawman. ‘I will make you free.’ When I opened my eyes it had gone, leaving those bones in the passenger compartment along with a small pile of coins. I thought for sure I’d gone mad.”

  Wax downed an extra vial of metals to refill his stores, then dried the vial out and took a sample of the dust. Lestib Square, named after the Lord Mistborn. It was worryingly close to the governor’s mansion. “Don’t worry. I’m on the thing’s trail. I intend to stop it.”

  “It said it would make me free,” Chapaou said. “If I’m not mad, then that means … that means that thing was real.”

  “It is,” Wax said.

  “Honestly, sir, I’d rather be crazy.”

  “Eh,” Wax said, rising and pushing Chapaou toward his coach. “The thing probably doesn’t want you dead anyway.”

  “Probably?”

  “No way to tell for certain,” Wax said, checking his ammunition. “But I’d bet money against it—at least, it no more wants you dead than it wants everyone in the city dead. Maybe. Not sure yet what its endgame is.”

  Chapaou looked sick. Damn. He was sure that last part had been comforting.

  “Go home,” Wax said, then tossed the man a few banknotes. “Or go find a hotel. Get some sleep. She isn’t going to come for you.”

  She had much bigger game to hunt.

  GUEST EDITORIAL:

  THE NUISANCE OF NEGLIGENT COINSHOTS!

  In the last sixteen months I have replaced three lamposts, an iron gate, and two steeple spires, all at my Madion Ways house. My residence in the 6th Octant, much nearer the Hub, has needed twice that attention due to it being on the main route of Coinshot couriers. Motor cars, carriages, bronze statues. None of these is safe from similar fates. Must our fine neighborhoods look like a return to the World of Ash?

  No! Let us take back our dignity! (Continued on Back.)

  VISITORS from other WORLDS

  Rarely does The House Record bring news of the sensational, but the reputable Lady Nicelle Sauvage of New Seran has contacted us with a report that will shock you.

  “I was lost in the mountains south of the Southern Roughs,” said Sauvage. “And my fellow travellers had either left me or died. That’s when I came upon a mountain pool of the most perfect blue, fed by the melting snows of the heights. Harmony, but I thought I’d reached Paradise.”

  As twilight struck early, as it is wont to do in the mountains, Sauvage saw a hunched figure by the pool. “Just a shadow, really,” she said. “Piercing eyes, and a face like some otherworldly beast from one of those hideous pulp stories. I regret to say I hadn’t the courage to engage this Visitor. Instead, its horrible visage struck right at my heart. I let preservation instinct take over and ran for an hour before making camp elsewhere.”

  (More on Back, Column 4.)

  * * *

  The Sinister Soiree!

  I described my assailant as wearing a striped white suit, but that is not as specific as it may seem. In Elendel, someone dressed as described would stick out like afternoon tea among koloss, but in New Seran the men run about in such vibrant suits that one would almost think they are all performers late for the circus. So I will be more specific. The gunman also wore mustaches waxed straight horizontal to a perfect point. The women on both sides of him stood back not only because he had brandished a gun, but also because they feared losing eyes to the sharp and glistening facial hair.

  I burned what little tin reserves I had left. (You will recall that I detailed the episode last week in “A Sport of Spirits” where I’d been forced to flare most of my tin to counteract the effects of winning a gentlemanly impromptu wine-sipping contest earlier in the evening.)

  “Stand down, sir,” I said, cursing myself for leaving Glint in my outer jacket taken by the servant when I’d entered the party. Had I become so soft since leaving the Roughs that I felt comfortable enough without Glint on my very person? Never! Unconsciously I knew that even without my trusty sidearm I was a match

  * * *

  16

  Wax perched on an electricity pylon, overlooking the governor’s mansion—a clean white building, brightly lit in the mists by floodlights. Those didn’t shine so strongly every night, and their brightness tonight seemed to indicate that Innate was worried. Th
e crowds were not dispersing. Men roamed the streets; there seemed to be more of them than there had been earlier, though the clock had struck midnight soon after Wax had left the Soothing parlor.

  He’d stopped by his house to rebind his arm wound, chew down some painkillers, and pick up some supplies: his hat, his short-barreled shotgun, and his thigh holster. He’d considered sending someone for Lord Harms, but honestly, Wax wanted him safe where Bleeder couldn’t use the man against him. Better that he stay hidden on his rooftop. In fact, he’d been half tempted to go fetch Steris and drop her somewhere similar. Time was short, unfortunately. He had to trust that the constables watching her would keep her hidden.

  From there, he’d walked the streets a short time, listening. He’d overheard anger at the government. Vitriol for the Pathians. Those complaints were bad enough, but mixed with them was a more disturbing trend. Anger, but with no focus. General discontent. The grumbling of men over their beers, of youths out on the street throwing rocks at cats. Hiding amid it all was a murderer, like a lion in the grass.

  At least the governor’s mansion looked calm. He’d come fearing the worst, a strike on Innate while he was away. She’s got me pinned, Wax thought with dissatisfaction, as the breeze rustled his mistcoat. I can’t stay and protect the governor because I have to follow leads and try to figure out her plan. But I can’t be as effective in that hunt because I keep worrying that I’m leaving Innate exposed.

  Could he convince the governor to hide? Beneath his feet, electricity ran like an invisible river through the suspended cables. Spirits that moved like Allomancers in the sky, hopping from building to building …

  Ah, lawman, a voice intruded upon his thoughts like a nail into a board. There you are.

  Wax reached to his waist for Vindication. Where? This had to mean Bleeder was close, right? Watching somewhere?

  Do you know, the voice said, about the body’s remarkable defenses? Inside, there are tiny bits of you that men never see. Even surgeons don’t know of them, for they’re too small. It takes a refined taste to distinguish them, know them. What is it that your friend likes to say? Ain’t nobody what knows the cow better than the butcher?

  Wax dropped down from his perch, slowing himself by Pushing on a discarded bottle cap. Mists churned around him, drawn by his Allomancy.

  If a tiny invader enters your blood, Bleeder said, the entire body begins to spin around it, to fight it, to find it and eliminate it. Like a thousand fingers of mist, like a legion of soldiers all too small to see. But what is very interesting is when the body turns upon itself, and these soldiers run wild. Free …

  “Where are you?” Wax asked loudly.

  Close, Bleeder said. Watching. You, and the governor. I will need to kill him, you know.

  “Can we talk?” Wax asked a little softer.

  Isn’t that what we’re doing?

  Wax turned, walking in the night. Either Bleeder would have to follow—which might let him catch motions in the mists—or he’d get far enough away that she couldn’t hear to reply to him, which would tell him which direction to search in.

  “Are you going to try to kill me?” Wax asked.

  What good would it do to kill you?

  “So you want games.”

  No. Bleeder sounded resigned. No games.

  “What, then?” Wax asked. “Why bother with all of this showmanship?”

  I’ll free them. Every one of them. I’ll take this people, and I’ll open their eyes.

  “How?”

  What are you, Waxillium? Bleeder asked.

  “A lawman,” Wax said immediately.

  That’s the coat you’re wearing right now, but it’s not who you are. I know. God knows I’ve seen the truth in you.

  “Tell me, then,” Wax said, still walking through the mists.

  I don’t think I can. I might be able to show you.

  Bleeder didn’t seem to have trouble hearing, though Wax had softened his voice. Allomancy? Or did she just have the ability to make ears that worked better than human ones? He kept searching. Perhaps one of those dark windows in the government building nearby? Wax headed that way. “Is that why you’re targeting the governor, then?” he asked. “You want to bring him down, free the people from the government’s oppression?”

  You know he’s just another pawn.

  “I don’t know that.”

  I wasn’t talking to you that time, Waxillium.

  He hesitated in the mists. The office building loomed before him, the windows a hundred hollow eyes. Most of those windows were closed—a common practice at night. No need to invite the mists in. Religion could say what it wished, and people believed, mostly. But the mists still made them uncomfortable.

  There, Wax thought, picking out an open window on the second floor.

  Very good, Bleeder said, and Wax saw something shift just inside the window, ambient light barely sufficient to let him discern it. Ever the detective.

  “I’m not much of one, actually,” Wax said. “In the Roughs, you solve fewer cases with investigation than with a good pair of guns.”

  That’s a fun lie, Bleeder said. Do you tell that one at parties to youths who’ve read too many stories about the Roughs? They don’t like hearing about interrogating family members of a man gone bad? Tracking down gunsmiths to see who fixed an outlaw’s rifle? Digging through an old campfire after days spent on the road?

  “How do you know about things like that?” Wax asked.

  I do my homework. It’s a kandra thing, which I assume MeLaan explained. Whatever you claim, you’re a good investigator. Maybe an excellent one. Even if you are, by definition, a dog chasing its own tail.

  Wax walked right up to the base of the building, the mist thinning between him and Bleeder, who skulked just inside the window about ten feet up. Her face, though enveloped by the shadows, seemed wrong to Wax. Shaped oddly.

  “Have you asked him?” Bleeder whispered from above, barely audible in the night. She had a rasping, dry voice, like the one in his head.

  “Who?”

  “Harmony. Have you asked why he didn’t save Lessie? A whisper at the right time, telling you not to split up. A warning in the back of your mind, telling you not to prowl down that tunnel, but instead circle around behind? You could have saved Lessie so easily with his help.”

  “Don’t speak her name,” Wax hissed.

  “He’s supposed to be God. He could have snapped his fingers and made Tan drop dead on the spot. He didn’t. Have you asked why?”

  Vindication was in Wax’s hand a moment later, pointing up toward that window. His other hand felt at his gunbelt for the pouch that held the syringes.

  Bleeder chuckled. “Ever quick with the gun. If you speak to Harmony again, ask him. Did he know the effect Lessie had on you, that she was what kept you out in the Roughs? Did he know, perhaps, that you’d never return here—where he needed you—as long as she was alive? Did he, perhaps, want her to die?”

  Wax fired.

  Not to hit Bleeder. He just needed to hear a crack in the night. That sound, so familiar, of breaking air. The bullet left a trail in the mist, and the wall beside Bleeder popped, scattering flakes of brick.

  Rusts … he was shaking.

  “I’m sorry,” Bleeder whispered. “For what I have to do. Cleaning the wound is often more painful than the cut itself. You will see, and understand, once you are free.”

  “No, we—”

  The mists churned. Wax stumbled back, swinging his gun toward something that had passed in a blur, leaving a corridor of swirling mist.

  Bleeder. Moving with Feruchemical speed.

  Toward the governor.

  Wax cursed, swinging Vindication behind himself and planting a bullet in the ground, then Pushing in a powerful burst. He launched through the mists toward the blazing light of the governor’s grounds, sweeping over the gates, startling a small flock of ravens, which scattered into the air around him.

  Two shots rang out in the night. As Wa
x crossed the grounds, he spotted Bleeder on the mansion’s front steps, wearing a body-length scarlet coat. The guards at the front doors lay dead at her feet. In the glow of the electric lights, he could see what was wrong with Bleeder’s face now—she wore a black-and-white mask. The Marksman’s mask, but twisted, broken up one side.

  She ducked into the building, not using her speed any longer. Wax landed beside the bodies—he didn’t have time to check them for life—and growled as he shoved into the building, gun out, and checked right, then left. The house steward screamed, dropping a tray of tea in the entryway as Bleeder skidded across the floor and into the next room.

  Wax followed, the main door ripping from its frame and flying out behind him into the night as he Pushed against it and its hinges to cross the room in a half run, half skim. He burst into the next chamber—a sitting room—with Vindication out, spinning the cylinder to one of the gun’s special hazekiller rounds. A Thug shot, extra-heavy slug, built to deliver as much force as possible.

  The room he entered was decorated with the kind of perfect furniture you found only in a house that had too many rooms. According to the blueprint he’d been given, under it would be the saferoom.

  Still the gun, Bleeder said in his mind as she leaped over a sofa, heading toward the wall, which hid the steps down to the saferoom. Useless. I cannot be killed with that.

  Wax raised Vindication and sighted, then fired, Pushing the bullet forward in a burst of extra speed. It hit Bleeder as she landed.

  Right in the ankle.

  The bone shattered and Bleeder collapsed as she tried to put weight on her ankle. She turned toward Wax, lips raised in a snarl visible through the broken side of the mask.

  Wax put a bullet through the eyehole in the mask.

  This is meaningless—

  He strode forward, shooting her in the hand as she tried to raise her gun. Wax pulled out the syringe, ready to Push it toward her skin, but she growled and became a blur. Wax tried to follow that blur—but at that moment, the side of the room burst open, revealing the hidden stairwell. A group of men in black suits and shotguns piled out, frantic. The governor’s special security.