The Bands of Mourning (Mistborn #6) - Brandon Sanderson Page 0,22

depicting the Bands of Mourning.

“What is that?” Marasi asked.

“One of our brothers,” MeLaan said, sitting up in her chair, “a kandra named ReLuur, took this image.”

“The Bands of Mourning fascinated him,” VenDell said. “ReLuur spent the last two centuries chasing them. He recently returned to Elendel bearing an evanotype camera in his pack and these pictures.” VenDell clicked to the next image, a picture of a large metal plate set into a wall and inscribed with a strange script.

Wax narrowed his eyes. “I don’t know that language.”

“Nobody does,” VenDell said. “It’s completely alien to us, unrelated to any Terris, Imperial, or other root. Even the old languages in Harmony’s records bear no resemblance to this script.”

Wax felt a chill as the images continued. Another shot of the strange language. A statue that resembled the Lord Ruler, bearing a long spear. This appeared to be covered in frost. Another shot of the mural, more detailed, which depicted bracers with many different metals twining together. Not bracers for a Ferring like Wax, but bracers for a Full Feruchemist.

Only a mural, yes. But it was compelling.

“ReLuur believed in the Bands,” VenDell said. “He claims to have seen them, though his camera bore no image of the actual relics. I’m inclined to trust his words.”

VenDell showed another image, of a different mural. It depicted a man standing atop a peak, hands raised above him and a glowing spear hovering there, just beyond his touch. A corpse slumped at his feet. Wax went forward, walking into the stream of light until he was standing right in front of the image, looking up at the portion he wasn’t blocking. The face of the man in the mosaic had eyes upturned and lips parted as if in awe at what he held.

He wore the bracers on his arms.

Wax turned around, but standing in the stream of light he couldn’t see anything in the room. “You mean to tell me your brother, this ReLuur, actually found the Bands of Mourning?”

“He found something,” VenDell said.

“Where?”

“He doesn’t know,” VenDell said softly.

Wax stepped out of the light, frowning. He looked from VenDell to MeLaan. “What?” he asked them.

“He’s missing a spike,” MeLaan said. “Best we could determine, he was accosted before he could return here from the mountains near the Southern Roughs.”

“We can’t get any straight answers out of him,” VenDell said. “A kandra with a missing spike … well, they aren’t quite sane any longer. As you well know.”

Wax shivered, a pit of emptiness shifting inside him. “Yes.”

“So, Miss Colms,” VenDell said, stepping away from his machine. “This is where you come in. ReLuur was … is … one of our finest. Of the Third Generation, he is an explorer, an expert at bodies, and a genius. Losing him would be a great blow to us.”

“We can’t reproduce,” MeLaan said. “Our numbers are set. The Thirds like ReLuur … they’re our parents, our exemplars. Our leaders. He is precious.”

“We would like you to recover his spike,” VenDell said. “From whoever took it. This will restore his sanity, and hopefully his memories.”

“The longer he goes without it, the bigger the holes will be,” MeLaan said.

“So perhaps you can understand our urgency,” VenDell said. “And why I found it prudent to interrupt Lord Ladrian, even on what was obviously an important day. When ReLuur returned to us, he was missing an entire arm and half his chest. Though he will not—or cannot—speak of where he got these pictures, he is able to recall being attacked in New Seran. We believe someone ambushed him there, on his return, and stole the artifacts he had discovered.”

“They have his spike,” MeLaan said, voice tense. “It’s still there. It has to be.”

“Wait, wait,” Marasi said. “Why not give him another spike? You’ve got enough of them lying around to make earrings, like the one you gave Waxillium.”

The two kandra looked at her as if she were mad, but Wax couldn’t see why. He thought the question was an excellent one.

“You are misunderstanding the nature of these spikes,” VenDell all but sputtered. “First, we do not have kandra Blessings ‘lying around.’ The earrings you mention are crafted from old Inquisitor spikes, and have barely any potency to them. One might have been good enough for Lord Waxillium’s little stunt six months ago, but they would hardly be enough to restore a kandra.”

“Yeah,” MeLaan said. “If that worked, we’d have already used all those spikes to make new children. We can’t; a kandra Blessing must be created very