The Alloy of Law (Mistborn #4)(53)

Whoever was behind this, the butler had been working with them for some time. And that meant they’d been watching Waxillium all along.

10

The carriage rattled on the paving stones as it rolled in a cautiously circuitous route toward the Fifth Octant. Marasi looked out at the busy street, her arms folded. Horses and carriages passed, and people flowed down sidewalks like the little blood cells through veins she’d looked at under a microscope at the university. They got clogged at corners or at sections where the paving stones were being replaced.

Lord Waxillium and Wayne sat on the other side of the carriage. Waxillium looked distracted, lost in his thoughts. Wayne was napping, head tipped back, eyes closed. He’d found a hat somewhere—a flimsy cap, of the type broadsheet boys liked to wear. After fleeing the mansion, they’d rounded the street corner and cut through Dampmere Park. On the other side, Waxillium had waved them down a carriage.

By the time they’d piled in, Wayne had been pulling on the cap, whistling softly to himself. She had no idea where he’d gotten it. Now he was snoring softly. After they’d nearly been killed, after he’d had the skin on his back seared off, he was sleeping. She could still smell the pungency of burned cloth, and her ears were ringing.

This was what you wanted, she reminded herself. You’re the one who insisted Lord Harms bring you along to meet Waxillium. You came to the mansion today of your own accord. You put yourself into this.

If only she’d made a better show of herself. She was riding in a carriage with the greatest lawman that the Roughs had ever known—but at every occasion, she’d proven herself to be a helpless girl, prone to bursts of useless emotion. She started to sigh, but cut herself off. No. No sulking. That would only make things worse.

They were paralleling one of the great spoke-canals that divided the eight parts of the city. She’d seen reproductions of pages from the Words of Founding, which had included drawings and plans for Elendel, though the name of the city had been chosen by the Lord Mistborn. There was a large round park at the center where flowers bloomed year-round, the air warmed by a hot spring underneath. The canal spokes radiated from it, extending out into the bountiful hinterlands, and the river divided around it. Streets and blocks were laid out in an orderly way, with large streets—wider than anyone would once have assumed they’d need. Yet now they almost seemed insufficient.

The carriage was approaching the bridge to the Field of Rebirth; the blanket of green grass and blooming Marewill flowers rose in a gradual hillside slope. The statues of the Last Emperor and the Ascendant Warrior dominated the top, capping their tomb. There was a museum there. Marasi had been there several times as a girl to look at the relics of the World of Ash that had been saved by the Originators, those who had been nurtured in wombs of the earth and reborn to build society.

The carriage turned along the tree-shaded drive around the Field of Rebirth. Asphalt paving was used here instead of stones to quiet the clatter of steel-shod hooves, and also smoothed the way for the occasional motorcar. Those were still rare, but one of her professors claimed that they would eventually replace horses.

She tried to keep her mind on their task. There was more to the Vanishers than just the kidnappings and the robberies. What of the way the trains’ cargo disappeared so abruptly, giving the Vanishers their name? And what of the extremely well-made weapons? And then there was the major effort to kill Waxillium, both with poison and that bomb.

“Lord Waxillium?” she said.

“Yes?”

“How did your uncle die?”

“Carriage accident,” he said, looking thoughtful. “He, his wife, and my sister were riding in the Outer Estates. This was mere weeks after my cousin—the heir—had succumbed to disease. The trip was supposed to help ease their grief.

“Uncle Ladrian wanted to visit a particular peak to get a view of the landscape, but my aunt was too weak for the hike. They took a carriage. Along the way, the horse bolted. The hitchings snapped. The carriage went off the cliffside.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I am as well,” he said softly. “I hadn’t been to see any of them in years. I feel a strange guilt, as if I should be more crushed to lose them.”

“I think that story involves enough crushed people already,” Wayne murmured.

Waxillium gave him a glare, though Wayne didn’t see it, as his eyes were still closed, the cap resting on his face.

Marasi kicked him in the shin, causing him to yelp. Then she blushed. “Be respectful of the dead,” she said.

Wayne rubbed his leg. “Already she starts orderin’ me around. Women.” He put his cap back on his face and settled back.

“Lord Waxillium,” she said. “Did you ever wonder if…”

“If someone might have killed my uncle?” Waxillium asked. “I am a lawkeeper. I wonder, if just briefly, about every death I hear of. But the reports I received indicated nothing suspicious. One of the things I learned early in my career was that sometimes, accidents simply do happen. My uncle was a risk taker. His gambling youth led to a middle age where he sought thrills. I eventually dismissed the tragedy as an accident.”

“And now?”

“And now,” Waxillium said, “I wonder if the reports sent to me were a little too clean. In retrospect, everything might have been carefully crafted not to arouse my suspicions. Beyond that, Tillaume was there, though he remained behind at the manor house the day of the accident.”