Mistborn Trilogy - Brandon Sanderson [898]
Yet, his mannerisms, his way of speaking, seemed to resemble her own. Is this what I might have been more like, she wondered, had I not been born a skaa? A blunt bureaucrat rather than a terse warrior?
As Yomen contemplated her, Ruin walked in a slow circle around the obligator king. “This one is a disappointment,” Ruin said quietly.
Vin glanced at Ruin just briefly. He shook his head. “Such destruction this one could have caused, had he struck out, rather than staying huddled in his little city, praying to his dead god. Men would have followed him. I could never get through to him on the long term, unfortunately. Not every ploy can be successful, particularly when the will of fools like him must be accounted for.”
“So,” Yomen said, drawing her attention back to him, “you came to take my city because you heard of my stockpile, and because you feared a return of the Lord Ruler’s power.”
“I didn’t say that,” Vin said, frowning.
“You said that you feared me.”
“As a foreign power,” Vin said, “with a proven ability to undermine a government and take it over.”
“I didn’t take over,” Yomen said. “I returned this city, and the dominance, to its rightful rule. But that is beside the point. I want you to tell me of this religion your people preach.”
“The Church of the Survivor?”
“Yes,” Yomen said. “You are one of its heads, correct?”
“No,” Vin said. “They revere me. But I’ve never felt that I properly fit as part of the religion. Mostly, it’s focused around Kelsier.”
“The Survivor of Hathsin,” Yomen said. “He died. How is it that people worship him?”
Vin shrugged. “It used to be common to worship gods that one couldn’t see.”
“Perhaps,” Yomen said. “I have . . . read of such things, though I find them difficult to understand. Faith in an unseen god—what sense does that make? Why reject the god that they lived with for so long—the one that they could see, and feel—in favor of one that died? One that the Lord Ruler himself struck down?”
“You do it,” Vin said. “You’re still worshipping the Lord Ruler.”
“He’s not gone,” Yomen said.
Vin paused.
“No,” Yomen said, apparently noting her confusion. “I haven’t seen or heard of him since his disappearance. However, neither do I put any credence in reports of his death.”
“He was rather dead,” Vin said. “Trust me.”
“I don’t trust you, I’m afraid,” Yomen said. “Tell me of that evening. Tell me precisely what happened.”
So Vin did. She told him of her imprisonment, and of her escape with Sazed. She told him of her decision to fight the Lord Ruler, and of her reliance on the Eleventh Metal. She left out her strange ability to draw upon the power of the mists, but she explained pretty much everything else—including Sazed’s theory that the Lord Ruler had been immortal through the clever manipulation of his Feruchemy and Allomancy in combination.
And Yomen actually listened. Her respect for the man increased as she spoke, and as he didn’t interrupt her. He wanted to hear her story, even if he didn’t believe it. He was a man who accepted information for what it was—another tool to be used, yet to be trusted no more than any other tool.
“And so,” Vin finished, “he is dead. I stabbed him through the heart myself. Your faith in him is admirable, but it can’t change what happened.”
Yomen stood silently. The older obligators—who still sat on their benches—had grown white in the face. She knew that her testimony might have damned her, but for some reason she felt that honesty—plain, blunt honesty—would serve her better than guile. That’s how she usually felt.
An odd conviction for one who grew up in thieving crews, she thought. Ruin had apparently grown bored during her account, and had walked over to look out the window.
“What I need to find out,” Yomen finally said, “is why the Lord Ruler thought it necessary for you to think that you had killed him.”
“Didn’t you listen