KanPaar snorted. “You said otherwise when you came to us a year ago, Third.”
“I told you what happened,” TenSoon said, standing tall. “What I said was not a lie. I helped Vin instead of Zane. Partially because of my actions, my master ended up dead at Vin’s feet. But I did not break my Contract.”
“You imply that Zane wanted you to help his enemy?” KanPaar said.
“No,” TenSoon said. “I did not break my Contract because I decided to serve a greater Contract. The First Contract!”
“The Father is dead!” one of the Seconds snapped. “How could you serve our Contract with him?”
“He is dead,” TenSoon said. “That is true. But the First Contract did not die with him! Vin, the Heir of the Survivor, was the one who killed the Lord Ruler. She is our Mother now. Our First Contract is with her!”
He had expected outcries of blasphemy and condemnation. Instead, he got shocked silence. KanPaar stood, stupefied, behind his stone lectern. The members of the First Generation were silent, as usual, sitting in their shadowed alcoves.
Well, TenSoon thought, I suppose that means I should continue. “I had to help the woman Vin,” he said. “I could not let Zane kill her, for I had a duty to her—a duty that began the moment she took the Father’s place.”
KanPaar finally found his voice. “She? Our Mother? She killed the Lord Ruler!”
“And took his place,” TenSoon said. “She is one of us, in a way.”
“Nonsense!” KanPaar said. “I had expected rationalizations, TenSoon—perhaps even lies. But these fantasies? These blasphemies?”
“Have you been outside recently, KanPaar?” TenSoon asked. “Have you left the Homeland in the last century at all? Do you understand what is happening? The Father is dead. The land is in upheaval. While returning to the Homeland a year ago, I saw the changes in the mists. They no longer behave as they always have. We cannot continue as we have. The Second Generation may not yet realize it, but Ruin has come! Life will end. The time that the Worldbringers spoke of—perhaps the time for the Resolution—is here!”
“You are delusional, TenSoon. You’ve been amongst the humans too—”
“Tell them what this is all really about, KanPaar,” TenSoon interrupted, voice rising. “Don’t you want my real sin known? Don’t you want the others to hear?”
“Don’t force this, TenSoon,” KanPaar said, pointing again. “What you’ve done is bad enough. Don’t make it—”
“I told her,” TenSoon said, cutting him off again. “I told her our Secret. At the end, she used me. Like the Allomancers of old. She took control of my body, using the Flaw, and she made me fight against Zane! This is what I’ve done. I’ve betrayed us all. She knows—and I’m certain that she has told others. Soon they’ll all know how to control us. And, do you know why I did it? Is it not the point of this judgment for me to speak of my purposes?”
He kept talking, despite the fact that KanPaar tried to speak over him. “I did it because she has the right to know our Secret,” TenSoon shouted. “She is the Mother! She inherited everything the Lord Ruler had. Without her, we have nothing. We cannot create new Blessings, or new kandra, on our own! The Trust is hers, now! We should go to her. If this truly is the end of all things, then the Resolution will soon come. She will—”
“Enough!” KanPaar bellowed.
The chamber fell silent again.
TenSoon stood, breathing deeply. For a year, trapped in his pit, he’d planned how to proclaim that information. His people had spent a thousand years, ten generations, following the teachings of the First Contract. They deserved to hear what had happened to him.
And yet, it felt so … inadequate to just scream it out like some raving human. Would any of his people really believe? Would he change anything at all?
“You have, by your own admission, betrayed us,” KanPaar said. “You’ve broken Contract, you’ve murdered one of your own generation, and you’ve told a human how to dominate us. You demanded judgment. Let it come.”
TenSoon turned quietly, looking up toward the alcoves where the members of the First Generation watched.
Perhaps … perhaps they’ll see that what I say is true. Perhaps my words will shock them, and they’ll realize that we need to offer service to Vin, rather than just sit in these caves and wait while the world ends around us.
But, nothing happened. No motion, no sound. At times, TenSoon wondered if anyone still lived up there. He hadn’t spoken with a member of the First Generation for centuries—they limited their communications strictly to the Seconds.
If they did still live, none of them took the opportunity to offer TenSoon clemency. KanPaar smiled. “The First Generation has ignored your plea, Third,” he said. “Therefore, as their servants, we of the Second Generation will offer judgment on their behalf. Your sentencing will occur in one month’s time.”
TenSoon frowned. A month? Why wait?
Either way, it was over. He bowed his head, sighing. He’d had his say. The kandra now knew that their Secret was out—the Seconds could no longer hide that fact. Perhaps his words would inspire his people to action.
TenSoon would probably never know.
Rashek moved the Well of Ascension, obviously.
It was very clever of him—perhaps the cleverest thing he did. He knew that the power would one day return to the Well, for power such as this—the fundamental power by which the world itself was formed—does not simply run out. It can be used, and therefore diffused, but it will always be renewed.
So, knowing that rumors and tales would persist, Rashek changed the very landscape of the world. He put mountains in what became the North, and named that location Terris. Then he flattened his true homeland, and built his capital there.
He constructed his palace around that room at its heart, the room where he would meditate, the room that was a replica of his old hovel in Terris. A refuge created during the last moments before his power ran out.
12
“I’M WORRIED ABOUT HIM, ELEND,” Vin said, sitting on their bedroll.
“Who?” Elend asked, looking away from the mirror. “Sazed?”
Vin nodded. When Elend awoke from their nap, she was already up, bathed, and dressed. He worried about her sometimes, working herself as hard as she did. He worried even more now that he too was Mistborn, and understood the limitations of pewter. The metal strengthened the body, letting one postpone fatigue—but at a price. When the pewter ran out or was turned off, the fatigue returned, crashing down on you like a collapsing wall.
Yet Vin kept going. Elend was burning pewter too, pushing himself, but she seemed to sleep half as much as he did. She was harder than he was—strong in ways he would never know.
“Sazed will deal with his problems,” Elend said, turning back to his dressing. “He must have lost people before.”
“This is different,” Vin said. He could see her in the reflection, sitting cross-legged behind him in her simple clothing. Elend’s stark white uniform was just the opposite. It shone with its gold-painted wooden buttons, intentionally crafted with too little metal in them to be affected by Allomancy. The clothing itself had been made with a special cloth that was easier to scrub clean of ash. Sometimes, he felt guilty at all the work it took to make him look regal. Yet it was necessary. Not for his vanity, but for his image. The image for which his men marched to war. In a land of black, Elend wore white—and became a symbol.