Kelsier shook his head. What does it take to kill this thing? he thought, Pushing himself up to his feet, backing away.
The Inquisitor strode forward. Some of the soldiers were trying to search the crowd for Ham and his men, but many just stood still. A fight between two powerful Allomancers was something whispered about, but never seen. Soldier and peasant stood dumbfounded, watching the battle with awe.
He’s stronger than I am, Kelsier acknowledged, watching the Inquisitor warily. But strength isn’t everything.
Kelsier reached out, grabbing smaller metal sources and Pulling them away from their owners—metal caps, fine steel swords, coin pouches, daggers. He threw them at the Inquisitor—carefully manipulating Steelpushes and Ironpulls—and kept his atium burning so that each item he controlled would have a fanning multitude of atium-images in the Inquisitor’s eyes.
The Inquisitor cursed quietly as it deflected the swarming bits of metal. Kelsier, however, just used the Inquisitor’s own Pushes against it, Pulling each item back, whipping them around at the creature. The Inquisitor blasted outward, Pushing against all the items at once, and Kelsier let them go. As soon as the Inquisitor stopped Pushing, however, Kelsier Pulled his weapons back.
The imperial soldiers formed a ring, watching warily. Kelsier used them, Pushing against breastplates, lurching himself back and forth in the air. The quick changes in position let him move constantly, disorienting the Inquisitor, allowing him to Push his different flying pieces of metal where he wanted them.
“Keep an eye on my belt buckle,” Dockson asked, wobbling slightly as he clung to the bricks beside Vin. “If I fall off, give me a Pull to slow the fall, eh?”
Vin nodded, but she wasn’t paying much attention to Dox. She was watching Kelsier. “He’s incredible!”
Kelsier lurched back and forth in the air, his feet never touching the ground. Bits of metal buzzed around him, responding to his Pushes and Pulls. He controlled them with such skill, one would have thought they were living things. The Inquisitor slapped them away with a fury, but was obviously having trouble keeping track of them all.
I underestimated Kelsier, Vin thought. I assumed that he was less skilled than the Mistings because he’d spread himself too thin. But that wasn’t it at all. This. This is his specialty—Pushing and Pulling with expert control.
And iron and steel are the metals he personally trained me in. Maybe he understood all along.
Kelsier spun and flew amid a maelstrom of metal. Every time something hit the ground, he flicked it back up. The items always flew in straight lines, but he kept moving, Pushing himself around, keeping them in the air, periodically shooting them at the Inquisitor.
The creature spun, confused. It tried to Push itself upward, but Kelsier shot several larger pieces of metal over the creature’s head, and it had to Push against them, throwing off its jump.
An iron bar hit the Inquisitor in the face.
The creature stumbled, blood marring the tattoos on the side of its face. A steel helmet struck it in the side, tossing it backward.
Kelsier began to shoot pieces of metal quickly, feeling his rage and anger mount. “Were you the one who killed Marsh?” he yelled, not bothering to listen for an answer. “Were you there when I was condemned, years ago?”
The Inquisitor raised a warding hand, Pushing away the next swarm of metals. It limped backward, putting its back against the overturned wooden cart.
Kelsier heard the creature growl, and a sudden Push of strength washed through the crowd, toppling soldiers, causing Kelsier’s metal weapons to shoot away.
Kelsier let them go. He dashed forward, rushing the disoriented Inquisitor, scooping up a loose cobblestone.
The creature turned toward him, and Kelsier yelled, swinging the cobblestone, his strength fueled almost more by rage than by pewter.
He hit the Inquisitor square in the eyes. The creature’s head snapped back, smacking against the bottom of the overturned cart. Kelsier struck again, yelling, repeatedly smashing his cobblestone into the creature’s face.
The Inquisitor howled in pain, reaching clawlike hands for Kelsier, moving as if to jump forward. Then it suddenly jerked to a stop, its head stuck against the cart’s wood. The spike tips that jutted from the back of its skull had been pounded into the wood by Kelsier’s attack.
Kelsier smiled as the creature screamed in rage, struggling to pull its head free from the wood. Kelsier turned to the side, seeking an item he had seen on the ground a few moments before. He kicked over a corpse, snatching the obsidian axe off the ground, its rough-chipped blade glittering in the red sunlight.
“I’m glad you talked me into this,” he said quietly. Then he swung with a two-handed blow, slamming the axehead through the Inquisitor’s neck and into the wood behind.
The Inquisitor’s body slumped to the cobblestones. The head remained where it was, staring out with its eerie, tattooed, unnatural gaze—pinned to the wood by its own spikes.
Kelsier turned to face the crowd, suddenly feeling incredibly wearied. His body ached from dozens of bruises and cuts, and he didn’t even know when his cloak had ripped free. He faced the soldiers defiantly, however, his scarred arms plainly visible.
“The Survivor of Hathsin!” one whispered.
“He killed an Inquisitor….” said another.
And then the chanting began. The skaa in the surrounding streets began to scream his name. The soldiers looked around, realizing with horror that they were surrounded. The peasants began to press in, and Kelsier could feel their anger and hope.
Maybe this doesn’t have to go the way I assumed, Kelsier thought triumphantly. Maybe I don’t have—
Then it hit. Like a cloud moving before the sun, like a sudden storm on a quiet night, like a pair of fingers snuffing a candle. An oppressive hand stifled the budding skaa emotions. The people cringed, and their cries died out. The fire Kelsier had built within them was too new.
So close … he thought.
Up ahead, a single, black carriage crested the hill and began to move down from the fountain square.
The Lord Ruler had arrived.
Vin nearly lost her grip as the wave of depression hit her. She flared her copper, but—as always—she could still slightly feel the Lord Ruler’s oppressive hand.
“Lord Ruler!” Dockson said, though Vin couldn’t tell if it was a curse or an observation. Skaa that had been packed in to view the fight somehow managed to make room for the dark carriage. It rolled down a corridor of people toward the corpse-littered square.
Soldiers pulled back, and Kelsier stepped away from the fallen cart, moving out to face the oncoming carriage.
“What is he doing?” Vin asked, turning toward Dockson, who had propped himself up on a small outcropping. “Why doesn’t he run? This is no Inquisitor—this isn’t something to fight!”
“This is it, Vin,” Dockson said, awed. “This is what he’s been waiting for. A chance to face the Lord Ruler—a chance to prove those legends of his.”
Vin turned back toward the square. The carriage rolled to a stop.
“But …” she said quietly. “The Eleventh Metal. Did he bring it?”
“He must have.”
Kelsier always said that the Lord Ruler was his task, Vin thought. He let the rest of us work on the nobility, the Garrison, and the Ministry. But this … Kelsier always planned to do this himself.