Shadows of Self (Mistborn #5)(55)

Both turned astonished eyes on him as he walked away. A rude move. He didn’t let himself care. He stepped into the center of the room, instincts screaming at him.

Guns out!

Firefight coming!

Find cover!

Run.

He did none of those things, but he couldn’t keep his eye from twitching. With his steel burning, a spray of small, translucent blue lines connected him to nearby sources of metal. He was in the habit of ignoring those.

Now he watched them. Quivering, shifting, the rhythm and pulse of a hundred people in a room. Trays for food, jewelry, spectacles. Metal parts in the tables and chairs. So much metal that made the framework for the lives of men and women. They were the flesh of civilization, and steel was now its skeleton.

So, you realize what I am, the voice said in his mind. Feminine, but rasping.

No, what are you? Wax sent back. A test.

Harmony spoke to you. I know that he did.

You’re a koloss, Wax said, using the wrong word on purpose.

You dance for Harmony, the voice replied. You bend and move at his direction. You don’t care how poor an excuse for a god he is.

Wax wasn’t certain—there was no way to be certain—but it seemed that Bleeder couldn’t read his mind. The kandra could only send out thoughts. What was it Harmony had said? That hearing thoughts had come from Preservation, but inserting them from Ruin?

Wax turned slowly about the room, watching those lines. Bleeder wouldn’t have any metal on her. People who were metallically aware were more careful about things like that. The governor’s guards, for example. Half of them carried guns, but the other half only dueling canes.

How do you stand it, Wax? Bleeder asked. Dwelling among them. Like living up to your knees in sewage.

“Why did you kill Winsting?” Wax asked out loud.

I killed him because he had to die. I killed him because nobody else would.

“So you’re a hero,” Wax said, turning about. She’s close by, he thought. Watching me. Who? Which one?

And if he thought he’d figured it out … did he dare fire first?

The strike of lightning is not a hero, Bleeder said. The earthquake is not a hero. These things simply exist.

Wax started walking through the room. Perhaps Bleeder would try to move along with him. He kept his hands to the sides, a coin in each fist. No guns yet. That would provoke a panic. “Why the governor?” Wax asked. “He is a good man.”

There are no good men, Bleeder said. Choice is an illusion, lawman. There are those created to be selfish and there are those created to be selfless. This does not make them good or evil, any more than the ravaging lion is evil when compared to the placid rabbit.

“You called them sewage.”

Sewage is not evil. That does not make it desirable.

Bleeder’s voice in his mind seemed to take on more personality as she spoke. Soft, haunting, morose. Like Bloody Tan had been.

Someone else moves us.…

“And you?” Wax asked. “Which are you? Wolf or rabbit?”

I am the surgeon.

The woman, the beauty in red, followed him. She tried to be surreptitious about it, walking over to a group to meet them and chat—but she moved parallel to Wax. There was another person following too. A short man in a server’s outfit carrying a tray of food. He made his rounds, but the other servers moved clockwise. Wax was going counterclockwise.

Were they close enough to hear him speaking? Not with natural ears. Perhaps Bleeder could burn tin. If that was the power she’d chosen for the evening.

You are a surgeon too, Bleeder said. They call you lord, they smile at you, but you aren’t one of them. If only you could be truly free. If only …

“I follow the law,” Wax whispered. “What do you follow?”

Bleeder gave no reply to that. The whisper, perhaps, had kept her from hearing.

The governor is corrupt, Bleeder said. He spent years covering for his brother, but in truth he would have done better covering for himself.

Wax looked to the side. He’d circled the room at this point, almost back to where he’d started. That server had followed all the way.

I have much work to do, Bleeder said. I need to free everyone in this city. Harmony crushes his palm against society, smothering it. He claims to not interfere, but then moves us like pieces on a board.

“So you’ll kill the governor?” Wax said. “That will somehow free the city?”

Yes, it will, Bleeder said. But of course I can’t kill him yet, Wax. I haven’t even murdered your father yet.

Wax felt suddenly cold. But his father was already dead. He spun, hand on his gun, and met the eyes of the server. The man froze, his eyes wide.

Then he ran.

Wax cursed, dashing after and flipping a coin out in front of himself. It spun in the air, but the waiter ducked behind a group of people. Wax gritted his teeth and let the coin drop without Pushing on it, instead unslinging Vindication. This prompted cries of worry from those in the party. The waiter ducked behind groups of people, ready to dodge Wax.

Fortunately, he—or she, or whatever—wasn’t ready for Wayne, who surged out between two plump women with cups of wine and flung himself at the waiter. Both went down in a heap. Wax slowed, raising his gun, taking aim. He couldn’t give Bleeder a chance to use Allomancy or Feruchemy, particularly if he was wrong about her using tin right now. A shot to the head wouldn’t kill a kandra, he guessed, but it should slow her down. Wax just had to be certain not to hit Wayne in the wrong—