The Bands of Mourning by Brandon Sanderson
Wayne winced.
“What did Wayne do now?” Marasi asked, a sense of resignation in her voice.
“He kicked that pack out right on top of them,” Telsin said.
“’S not my fault,” he said. “Wax woke me up too soon. Put me off balance.” He looked back at the ship’s other occupants. Wax sighed, moving up beside the pilot. Steris and MeLaan sat on the back bench, out of the way—MeLaan lounging in a rather attractive way, Steris bent over a large notebook. Taking notes? What was wrong with that woman?
Down below, the men in the snow held their lanterns high and scanned the sky, seeming confused.
“Move us away,” Wax said to the masked pilot, pointing. “Go the direction they’re hiking.”
“Yes, Decisive One,” the pilot fellow said, and the fans at the sides of the thing grew louder. “Hold on, everyone.”
The ship shifted. Not quickly, but it did start moving again. Neat trick that had been, staying in place while flying. Birds couldn’t do that, just Coinshots. Wayne moved forward, sidling past Marasi to get a good look out the front of the ship.
“Wind is picking up,” the pilot mentioned. “Might be a storm, as if things weren’t cold enough already.”
“There,” Wax said, pointing. “What was that?”
“I’ll bring us around,” the pilot fellow said, swinging the ship, which rocked precariously. Another gust of wind brought flakes of snow in through the openings in the ship’s walls.
“That’s it,” Wax said, peering through the curtain of snow. “Harmony’s Rings … it’s really here.”
“I don’t see anything,” Wayne said, squinting.
“Hold on to something,” the pilot fellow said. “Or make sure you’re strapped in. I’m going to land.”
So Wayne grabbed the man’s arm.
“Something else.”
Wayne grabbed the chair’s back, and good thing he did, since the ship pitched to the side as it came down. The landing wasn’t too bad, assuming you liked getting shaken about and then having your face smacked into the wall.
Wayne blinked, finding himself in blackness. A moment later MeLaan managed to relight her lantern and hold it up, showing that the ship had settled halfway on its side, one of the fan wings—which could fold up so the thing could fit in the larger ship—having bent up on its hinges, with a big heap of snow pushed in through the hole in the ship’s side.
“Is that how it usually goes?” Wax asked, standing up shakily on the sloping floor.
“Landing is difficult,” the pilot fellow admitted.
“Technically,” Marasi said from the back, “it’s not. It’s probably the easiest thing to do with a flying ship, assuming you’re not picky.”
Wayne snorted, climbing across the ship to the side that was pointed upward, and hopped out. The snow crunched when he dropped into it. He hadn’t expected that—the only snow he’d seen had been the occasional flurry up in the Roughs, and it never got anywhere near this deep. Why would it crunch? The stuff was made of water, not cereal flakes.
He stumbled out of the high pile of snow onto a windswept rocky portion of ground. Snow pelted him like grains of sand, but it didn’t seem to be coming from the sky, just getting blown in from the side. He shivered and tapped more warmth. The clouds happened to roll out of the way, releasing starlight like a bouncer stepping back and letting folks into the night’s most exclusive club.
That light cascaded down, white and calm, upon a rusting castle in the middle of the mountains. A bleak stone fortress, cut of the same stone as the field. It looked to be only one story, hunkered down against the wind, but it glowed in the starlight like the spirit of some ancient building from anteverdant days.
Wayne breathed out slowly, his breath making white mist before him. “Nice,” he said, nodding. “Nice.” The folks that built this, they had style.
Marasi clambered out of the ship, wearing Wax’s mistcoat for some reason, and almost fell face-first in the snow. She stood on top of the white fluff, a gust of wind almost knocking her over again, until suddenly she sank down into it farther with a crunch. She’d finally remembered to stop filling her weight metalmind. Easy mistake to make, if you weren’t accustomed to being a Feruchemist.
She pushed through the snow and joined Wayne, wiping melted snow from her brow. She looked to be doing well, considering that she’d been shot.
“Suit and his people aren’t far off,” she said. “And they know we’re here, now.”
“Then we find the Bands first,” Wax said from behind them. It was seriously unfair how he glided up out of the machine, then soared on a quick jump to land next to them, no stumbling in that snow. Seriously. Why had Harmony made the stuff? Didn’t seem to serve much of a purpose. “Everyone grab your things. Allik, remove the grenade from the ship, just in case.”
They all hurried to obey, Marasi climbing back in the machine, then joining Steris in handing the packs out. Allik emerged, wearing that mask of his still, and stood on the side of his ship, staring at the fortress and shaking his head. He then turned and patted his ship, like it was some kind of puppy, until Steris appeared and chased him away for some reason. A few moments later Marasi climbed out, wearing a dress instead of her uniform, but with trousers on underneath. She tossed Wax his mistcoat.
Figures. A woman would have to change outfits for this. Can’t infiltrate a remote, ancient temple without properly accessorizing. Wayne ran his hand through his hair, then had a moment of panic. His hat! He scrambled back toward the ship, looking around frantically, but then spotted it peeking from a snowdrift nearby, having fallen free as they landed. He picked it up with a sigh of relief.
“Everyone back,” Wax said, steadying himself with a stable footing, the wind blowing his mistcoat tassels back and whipping them about. The others moved away from the ship, and Wax grunted, Pushing. The ship skidded back softly into the snow, piling it up in a wave. Wax Pushed until the thing was completely buried.
“Nice,” Wayne said.
“Let’s hope one of their Coinshots or a Lurcher doesn’t spot it beneath the snow,” Wax said, turning toward the temple and shouldering his shotgun. “Come on, let’s get out of this wind.”
They picked up the packs and started across the stone field toward the fortress. Steris had found another lantern somewhere, and lit it. Wayne hurried his step and fell in beside that pilot fellow with the mask.
“You know,” Wayne said, “I’m an Allomancer too.”
The man said nothing.
“I figured you’d want to know,” Wayne said, “since it seems like this is your religion and all. In case you wanted someone else to worship.”
Again no reply.
“I’m a Slider,” Wayne said. “Speed bubbles, you know? Those fancy titles would work for me just fine, I think. Handsome One. Smart One. Um … Guy wif the Great Hat.”
The only sound was that of their footfalls and the gusting wind.
“Now, see,” Wayne said, “this is unfair. Wax doesn’t want you to worship him, right? But you gotta have someone to worship. It’s human nature. It’s ingratiated in us. So, I’m willin’ to be accommodatin’ and let you—”
“He can’t understand you, Wayne,” Marasi said, marching past. “He’s swapped metalminds to keep himself warm.”
Wayne stopped in place as they all hiked onward. “Well, when he gets his brain back, someone tell him I’m a god, all right?”
“Will do,” Wax called from up ahead.
Wayne sighed, moving to catch up, but then stopped. What was that off to the side? He shouldered his pack and hiked over, ignoring Marasi’s call that he turn back. There was something there, near the cliffs. A hulking shape bigger than a house, the exposed bits covered in frost.
Wax strode over, squinting against the wind, and grunted. “Another ship,” he said. “The one that the Hunters sent.”
“The who?”
“Group of people from Allik’s region,” Wax said. “They came here to dest
Wax nodded, then they hiked back toward the others. Marasi and Steris had waited, along with the masked man—who had crossed half the distance to the new ship, then stopped, staring at it. Telsin had strode on ahead, MeLaan tailing her. He quickly joined the rest of them as they followed after Telsin and MeLaan.
“Your sister,” Wayne said to Wax, “is kinda…”
“Severe?” Marasi said.
“I was gonna say bonkers,” Wayne admitted. “Though I’m not sure if it’s the good kinda bonkers or the bad kind, as of yet, as I haven’t had time to give it the proper evaluatin’.”
“She’s been through a lot,” Wax said, eyes ahead. “We’ll get her home and give her some physicians to talk to. She’ll mend.”
Wayne nodded. “Course, she won’t fit in wif us anymore if she does.”
They continued, and that fortress, rusts it was impressive. Made of broad stone blocks, the type that some poor fellow probably broke his back lugging about, it had steps out front leading up to an enormous statue. At first he was surprised, as all the way out here seemed an odd place for a sculpture—but then, the ones back in Elendel had been shat on by about a million birds, so perhaps this was the best place to keep your statue.
The group of them made their way up the steps, fighting the wind. The medallion meant the wind wasn’t cold enough to chill his nethers, but it was still annoying. At the top of the steps they had to walk around that statue, which was in the shape of a fellow in a long coat holding a spear to his side, its tip resting on the stones. Wayne scratched his face, stepping back and craning his neck.
“What’s wrong with his eye?” Wayne asked, pointing.
Marasi stepped up beside him, squinting in the darkness. “A spike,” she said softly. “Like on that coin of Waxillium’s.”
Yup, that was it. One spike, jutting through his right eye. Wayne rounded the statue, which had snow piled about its base.
“One spiked eye,” Wax said, thoughtful. “This place was built by the Lord Ruler. Why would he have them make a statue of him with one eye spiked through?”
“He carries a spear,” Marasi said. “For the one that he used to kill the Survivor?”
“A metal spear,” Wax noted. “But no lines. Aluminum. Looks like some on his belt too. Expensive.”
Marasi nodded. “The Lord Ruler was run through with three spears, by the Lord Mistborn’s testimony. ‘Once stabbed by a beggar, for the poverty he brought. Once stabbed by a worker, for the slavery he enforced. Last stabbed by a prince, for the lords he corrupted.’ The spears didn’t hurt him.”
“Come on,” Telsin called from inside the building, where she’d been joined by Steris.
Wax and the masked fellow moved off, but Wayne kept looking up at the statue.
“So I’ve been thinkin’,” Wayne said as MeLaan passed him.
“Yeah?” she asked, glancing at him.
Rusts. Wax might think it weird, considering she was like a billion years old or something, but it seemed like even longer since a woman had looked at him like that. It wasn’t a lusty look or anything like that, it was … what was the word …
Fond.
Yup, that would do.
“Wayne?” she asked.
“Oh, right. Um, well, this place is abandoned, right? So none of the stuff in it belongs to anyone.”
“Well, I’m sure a lot of people would claim it,” MeLaan said. “But ownership would be tough to prove.”
“So…”
“So I’d say don’t touch anything anyway,” MeLaan said.
“Oh. Right.”
She smiled at him, then continued on in through the open doorway behind the statue. It was big, gaping, like a fellow’s mouth after you kick ’im right in the canteen.
He looked back at the statue, then poked at the spearhead with his toe. Then he hit it with his heel. Then he hit with a rock. Finally, he twisted it a few times.
It fell right off, clanging to the stone beneath. It had been practically hanging free. And Wax was wrong, only the head was of metal—the oversized spear was wood. Aluminum, you say? Wayne thought with a smile.
Now, he didn’t care much for what rich folks said was worth money. Unless it was, by itself, worth more than a house. Little Sophi Tarcsel, the inventor, did need more funds.
He wrapped the big spearhead, which was as large as his palm, with a handkerchief to keep it from freezing his fingers off, and started whistling as he jogged after the others. As he passed, he noticed that there once had been gates on this doorway, big ones, but they lay in frozen splinters.
The others had gathered inside, where the temple had some kind of entryway. It had murals on either side, just like the ones that the strange kandra chap had shown back in Wax’s mansion. Wayne stepped up to one, beside Wax, who was inspecting it.
Yup. Same mural. One depicting a pair of bracers on a pedestal, the other—across the way—depicting the Lord Ruler wearing them.
“We’ve found the place for certain, then,” Wax said. “The statue was enough evidence, but this seals it. ReLuur was here.”
Together they left the entryway, stepping through its only door into a long, dark hallway. What were those lumps ahead? MeLaan and Steris held their lanterns higher, though nobody seemed to have any inclination to be the first one to proceed.
The masked fellow, though, he was muttering something in funny-talk. He seemed to be following something with his eyes. A metal pattern on the wall? He stepped to the side, and dug the little grenade from his pocket. He did something, opening its side, then used tweezers to extract what looked like a small nugget of metal. He shoved it into a cavity in the wall, then pulled down a lever.
Wayne heard what he thought was distant humming, then a series of small blue lights started glowing on the walls. As was appropriate to match the atmosphere of this rusting place, they were creepier than Steris in the morning. There were no bulbs or anything rational like that, just sections of the walls that seemed to be made of translucent glass that glowed in a downright gloomy way.
It was enough to light up the lumps on the floor. Bodies. A right disturbing number of them, lying in awkward positions. And those pools around them … frozen blood.
Wayne whistled softly. “They really went far to give this place a creepy look.”
“Those bodies weren’t here originally,” Wax said dryly. “I think they must be— Wayne, what the hell is that?”
“It fell right off,” Wayne said, clutching the spearhead, which was cold to the touch, even through the handkerchief. The tip was peeking out on one side. “I didn’t even look at it, Wax. Musta been loosened by the wind. See, it has a hole on the bottom for screwing off and—”
“Don’t touch anything,” Wax said, pointing at him. “Else.”
MeLaan gave him a look.
“You shut up,” Wayne said to her.
“Didn’t say a word, Wayne.”
“You implied one. That’s worse.”
Wax sighed, looking at the pilot fellow, who was inspecting some carvings on the wall. “Allik?” Wax said, then tapped the medallion he’d tied to his wrist.
The masked man sighed, but swapped out one of his medallions for the other. He immediately shivered. “I have now been to hell,” he said. “These mountains will rise all the way there for certain.”
“You think hell is in the sky?” Steris asked, standing close to Wax, practically clinging to him.
“Of course it is,” Allik said. “Dig down deep enough in the ground, and things get warm. Hell must be the other way. What did you want of me, Great Metallic Destroyer?”
Wax sighed. “Bodies,” he said, nodding down the hallway. “Traps?”
“Yes,” Allik said. “The ones who b
“What?” Wax said.
“Those masks,” Allik said.
“The masks of Hunters?” Wax asked.
Allik looked at him, shocked. “How did you recognize them?”
“I didn’t,” Wax said, walking forward carefully. Wayne joined him, as did MeLaan. Wax waved for Marasi, Steris, and Telsin to remain back, though he gestured for Allik to join them.
Together, the four of them walked to the first set of corpses. Wax knelt down beside the pool of frozen blood. The closest fellow had died miserably, with a spike through his chest. Wayne could see the trap now, the tip of it still jutting from the wall. The poor fellow’s mates must have tried to pull him free of the spike, but then had gotten caught in traps themselves.
The masks were different from Allik’s, that was for sure. Made of wood with bits of glass stuck to them, each in a different, odd pattern. And these ones showed the mouth, covering the top half the face, then running down the sides. The skin there, at the sides of the mask, seemed to have melded with the wood—though that might be because everything in here was as cold as a spinster’s bedroom.
Wax nudged the mask. “You said the Hunters came to destroy this place.”
“Yes,” Allik said.
“Well, I think they either lied to you, or changed their minds.” Wax nodded toward the busted doors, then down the hallway, littered with bodies. “The lure of the Bands was too powerful for these fellows. I’d guess the dead ones we found near the ship were the ones determined to go through with blowing up the whole place. Got betrayed, but then these betrayers in turn fell to the traps. The ones who returned home; what happened to them? Vanished?”
“Yes,” Allik said, cocking his head. He raised his mask, revealing a wonderfully silly mustache and beard, then regarded Wax with awed eyes. “They went back to the Hunters. Then … gone. Returned to their families, it was said.”
“Executed,” Wax said, rising. “It was discovered they helped murder the rest of their crew, then tried to steal the Bands. They turned back because of the traps killing too many of their fellows, took a skimmer because it was all they could man, and returned with a made-up story of a blizzard. They were going to gather another crew and try again. Their superiors caught them first.”