Beautiful Destroyer
Chapter Eight
"Familiar?" Loiuse shouted. "Where are you going? I'm not done talking to you!"
But her familiar was done talking to her. Louise watched her climb out the window and disappear into the night, and there wasn't a thing she could do to stop her.
She rubbed some feeling back into her hand. She hadn't meant to slap Vin, but the look her familiar had given her right afterward ... well, it was her own fault for talking to her like that!
Louise shook her head. I spend the whole time trying to get you to talk, and then as soon as you do I want you to shut up. She'd ... she'd ...
What makes you think he would fall in love with you?
That. That was just hurtful. Louise didn't even want a familiar who would talk to her like that. Vin owed her an apology as soon as she came back.
If she comes back.
Louise shook her head again, pushing the thought away. Of course she was coming back. Vin couldn't just leave, she was her familiar! Besides, where would someone like her, a powerful mage ... used to living on the streets ... with the background of an assassin or a pickpocket or something ... and who had all of Louise's money with her ... where would someone like that go?
Anywhere she liked, in a place like this. And she'd probably create a better life for herself on her own than the one Louise had given her.
Oh, Founder. And at a time like this, behind enemy lines on a mission from Princess Henrietta. It's all falling apart, and it's all my fault. If she didn't come back, then they couldn't risk too much time looking for her, and Louise would have to rely exclusively on Guiche—blegh—and ... and on Wardes.
What makes you think he would fall in love with you?
Nothing. But that was how it worked, right? Love defied reason; all the romance novels said so. She believed that Wardes loved her because he told her that he did and because ... and because she really, really wanted to.
No one has a right to be happy.
Louise threw herself on the bed and buried her head in a pillow. Shut up, Vin! I don't need this right now.
But Vin was right. If happiness was a right, Louise would have had it by now. What she had now was her duty. She had a duty to her Princess to fulfill the mission and not let her personal feelings get in the way. She had a duty to her family to secure a beneficial alliance, which meant either marrying Wardes or determining that he was not beneficial to her family. And she had a duty to her familiar to ... to ... well, that part was complicated. Most familiars needed a food bowl and a rug to sleep on, and that was it. But she had a duty to her familiar, and she'd figure out what it was.
So no moping! If she went to bed now, she'd lie awake feeling sorry for herself until Vin came back—if she comes—no! None of that. She was going to do something.
She got out of bed, strode down the hallway, and knocked on Wardes' and Guiche's door.
Guiche opened up. "Oh, it's you." He peered over her and found no one. "Well, I suppose that's good too."
Louise kicked him in the shins on account of her wanting to kick someone and him deserving it.
"Ow! What was that for?"
"For being rude. Now invite me in."
He gritted his teeth. "Lady Valliere, would you grace this humble suite with your presence?"
"I will, yes." She stepped inside and looked around. "Where's Wardes?"
"He's out on the balcony," he said, limping. "You know how claustrophobic wind mages get. Out of curiosity, does your familiar have any strong feelings toward poetry?"
Louise turned on him. "Are you writing a poem for my familiar?"
He stood up straight. "I never said that, though I understand why you might leap to such a conclusion."
She rolled her eyes. We haven't even been gone a week! She doubted that it was anything serious though. Guich probably just wanted to stay in practice. "First of all, you disgust me. Second of all, does your poem tell Vin that she's stupid and ugly and no one will ever love her? No? Then I doubt she'll be interested."
He hesitated. "But none of those things rhyme with the word 'rose.' Few things do that fit the theme I'm working with, to be honest. Nose? There's nothing romantic about the nose. Toes? I've never understood what Malicorne sees in that part of the body. I feel rather proud about the 'Let's not be foes,' line, though the one ending in 'clothes' might be too forward."
"Wardes! Save me!" she said, rushing toward the balcony only to find it empty. "Wardes?"
"Up here, Louise," he said, floating over the roof, his cape pillowing in the wind. "What troubles you?"
"Guiche was trying to read me poetry."
"How villainous," he said. "How cruel." There was no humor in his voice, or even any emotion, but that was just his way of speaking. His was a dry wit, and Louise could foresee it growing on her.
"Everyone's a critic," Guiche said. "I despise the lot of you."
Wardes turned to him. "My apologies, Gramont. Your artist's soul has only served us well. Louise, let us leave the poet with his quill. I fear we may never see this city again as it is now, and I wish to share it with you while I can."
"Well, I can hardly refuse a request like that," she said, feeling ... feeling nothing. Back in La Rochelle being with him had made her feel everything at once, nervousness, giddiness, happiness, and everything in between. Now all she felt was the anticipation of those feelings ... and then nothing.
She blamed Vin for that. Before she had been in love with all the unbridled enthusiasm of a child combined with the mature sophistication of a woman, but now? Now she couldn't believe in Wardes like she had before. She wanted to, desperately, but then there was the voice of her familiar like a black stain on a white dress saying, He's only saying what he knows you want to hear.
She tried to push the thought aside as Wardes carried her down to the ground below. It had always felt demeaning to be carried before, as though reality had deemed it necessary to remind her that she couldn't cast even the simplest of wind spells, reducing her to a burden in the most literal sense imaginable. But when Wardes did it, holding her in his strong arms against his taut chest, well, even if she grew to become a greater wind mage than him, she'd probably still let him do this.
Loiuse walked with him through the city streets, with both his arm and his cape across her shoulders. The cool night air made a good justification for that. Wardes didn't try to bother her with small talk. He was comfortable with silence, perhaps not to the degree that Tabitha was, but far more than Louise was. Silence was a void to her, pulling words from her mouth to fill it.
But what to say? The last time they were alone, Louise had told him about Vin. She had wanted to impress her betrothed, so she couldn't exactly talk about herself, and Vin had been ... still was the most impressive thing about her. Wardes had been the perfect audience back then, always showing the right amount of interest, but Louise couldn't bring herself to brag about her familiar after ... after ...
What makes you think he would fall in love with you?
"Wardes?" she said at last. "Do you remember Ged?"
He hesitated, and for the first time since they had begun their journey, he seemed genuinely surprised. "My old familiar? Yes, though I'm surprised you do."
She didn't, but she remembered remembering him. Grey and brown feathers perched on his shoulder. She had been, what, six at the time? Seven? "Did you ever summon another one?"
"No."
"Why not?"
He paused to consider his words before speaking. He always considers his words.
"Because I don't need one anymore. The sparrowhawk was useful while I had him, but few mages keep their familiars for long. They're an extra pair of eyes and can perform some simple tasks, but for the most part they're little more than a favored pet."
"Oh." She bit her lip. "At the academy they told me a familiar was a lifetime commitment."
"It is, but familiars seldom live long, just enough to serve their purpose. Why do you ask? Are you having troubles with your own familiar?"
"Of course not!" Louise went stiff. Had that come off as too snappish? Her sharp tongue deterred potential suitors at school as much as her subpar magecraft did, but that was because she didn't like any of them. Wardes was Wardes, and she was not going to screw this up. First time for everything. "No, but I appreciate your concern. The ... stress of the mission is getting to her, and her strength makes her difficult to discipline, but she's still on board." She hoped.
Please come back.
If Wardes found out that she had driven off her familiar during a mission in enemy territory, that would kill her. Everyone at the academy knew about Louise the Zero's nearly flawless track record of failure, but she would do anything to prevent Wardes from learning about it. Even worse, losing Vin could doom the mission, disappoint the Princess, plunge Tristain into war, and, and ...
The silence engulfed them both, and Louise began to worry that Wardes had seen through her deception and was about to call her out on it.
"Would you like to know how I disciplined my familiar?" Wardes asked at last.
Louise looked up at him. "I didn't know you ever needed to."
"Everyone needs to. Even those who don't and let their familiars run wild need to, and they fail their familiars through mercy and neglect."
"So what did you do?"
Wardes stared ahead as they walked down the empty street. "The technical aspects of Ged's training matter little, to be honest. Training in general, whether it be a familiar, a soldier, a pet, or a pack animal, is a set of positive and negative reinforcement. Ged was locked in a cage when he disobeyed me, and he was permitted to fly when he was good. Attached to a string, of course, and even then I could fly faster than he could."
"I ... I don't see how that helps." If she tried to tie a string to Vin, Vin would either break the string, break Louise, or break them both.
"No, Vin is no bird. But there is one universal quality of every familiar that every mage must understand, whether it be a dragon or a mouse, and it is this: the familiar is weak."
"Not every familiar," Louise said. "Not mine. She beat you in your duel, remember?"
"Yes," he agreed. "But who pushed her to fight? Who forced her hand when she would rather have backed down? You did. You held firm and she bent to your will. That is the difference between the master and the familiar. Strength, not here," he placed his hand on the hilt of his sword-wand, "but here." He put his hand on his heart.
Louise nodded slowly. Despite her incredible strength, Vin had a weak heart. A coward's heart. Louise had hated Vin's cowardice as soon as she discovered it, feeling as though it made her unworthy of her strength, but maybe ... maybe that was the Founder's way of balancing things out.
"You may not be strong with magic yet," Wardes said, "but you have a stronger heart than anyone I have ever met."
Her eyes widened and she felt her face grow hot. "You flatter me, Wardes," was something she should have said. "Take care to guard your silver tongue till our wedding night," would have worked too, possibly accompanied by a flirtatious wink. "Mugwuh?" she said instead, and she had no idea what that meant.
"I mean it," he said, "and that will serve you more than a hundred dragon knights in bringing your familiar to heel. Be as hard and as unyielding as steel, and your familiar will bend around you as a vine grows around a stone wall."
Rule of Steel. She nodded slowly. "I understand."
"Do you?" He looked down at her with his steel-grey eyes, and there was no doubt in Louise's mind why her parents approved of their match. "Then understand this. No matter how much stronger she is than you, she will never be above you. You are both human, but that does not make her your equal. She may bear the mark of Gandalfr upon her hand, the greatest of the Founder's familiars, but that makes you Brimir's heir and mage of the Void. She was given to you the day you summoned her as an extension of your will and an appendage to your destiny, and needs no will of her own."
Louise swallowed, feeling her mouth go dry. "I ... okay." She tried to sound confident, but her words came out as barely a whisper. Still, Wardes seemed to accept that and he turned away, freeing her from his gaze.
As soon as they resumed walking, though, a figure fell out of the night sky, landing right in front of them. Louise jumped and let out a less than dignified squeak before she recognized her familiar's grey and tattered cloak. Wardes' hand shot to the hilt of his sword-wand, but he stopped before drawing it. "Oh," Louise said, trying to sound calm and composed. "It's you." Don't startle me like that!
Vin's eyes flickered from her to Wardes, and she looked about to bolt. She always looked like she was about to bolt. "We need to leave," she said. "It's not safe here."
First you're rude to me, then you abandon me, and now you're making demands? Sure, her strength was impressive, but the rest of her got on Louise's nerves. Though really it was Louise's own fault for letting Vin get away with as much as she did. She should have been a better master, stronger and more firm.
She let out a heavy sigh that she only had to force a little bit. "Really? That's what you're going with? Okay, fine. We'll leave tomorrow morning." That was what they were already planning.
"That's not good enough," Vin said, not even looking at her. "We need to leave right now."
Louise could see Guiche coming up the road toward them, accompanied by his giant mole. He was the only person she had ever met who could sashay naturally ... and he was packed. He had packed his bags, not from Louise's decision or even from a group decision, but from Vin's decision. "You forget yourself, familiar," she said, narrowing her eyes at her. "While I may choose to listen to your advice, you are not in charge of this mission, I am. I do not take orders from you, you take orders from me."
She felt good, she felt proud, and most of all, she felt Wardes' approval. Rule of Steel. Louise held Vin's gaze and waited for her to back down as she always did. But this time Vin stood up straight and looked her dead in the eye, and Louise found steel staring back at her. "I was attacked," she said, her voice cold and strong. "Just this night, someone tried to kill me while I was walking down the street. It—is not—safe here."
"You were attacked?" Wardes said, stepping in. "By whom?"
"I don't know."
"What did he look like?"
"I don't know. He wore a mask, and—"
"Why wear a mask? If our enemies knew our true business, why not alert the watch to arrest us? Why the cloak and dagger in their own land?"
"I don't know!" She turned back to Louise. "I don't know why anything happens. I only know what I saw. I ..." She closed her eyes, and when she opened them Louise saw weakness for the first time. Not a weak appearance, Vin often looked weak, she often looked afraid that Louise might hurt her. But this was the first time that she looked like she could be hurt. "Do you trust me?"
Louise felt the pressure shift back to her, and she had gotten lost when Vin started talking about masked assassins. That ... that was bad, right? That was the sort of shadow Vin was always jumping at but Louise knew she would never find but now she had and ... and she didn't know what to do.
She glanced at Wardes, wishing that he would take over ... but he couldn't. Wardes wasn't in charge any more than Vin was. Louise was, not because she was experienced or skilled, but because the Princess had made it so.
It doesn't matter why I'm in charge, it only matters that I am. Noblesse Oblige in a nutshell. Besides, she knew what Wardes would want her to do. He'd want her to stand firm, put her familiar in her place, and not let Vin push her around. If Louise didn't, Wardes would be disappointed.
But if she did, Vin would be hurt.
Grinding her teeth, Louise threw up her hands in frustration. "Alright."
Vin stared at her in shock, and Wardes stared at her in ... something unreadable. "What?" Vin said.
Louise turned away, feigning indifference toward the entire issue. "Alright," she said, squeezing annoyance into her tone. "This town was boring me anyway. I guess we'll spend another night sleeping on a ship, but the sooner we reach Newcastle, the sooner we can all go home."
Founder knew she'd be happy to put this whole mission behind her.
She walked toward the docks, not willing to look anyone in the eye just yet. Would Wardes be disappointed to find out that her heart was just as weak as the rest of her? She didn't know, but Vin was walking right behind her, and Louise felt as though that encounter could have gone much worse.
WWW
Acquiring a ship, even one this late at night in a kingdom at war, was easy. Suspiciously easy to Vin, but no one else shared her concerns. Guiche took point in the con, explaining to the dock master that he was eloping with his lady love along with a body guard and a servant and wanted a ship quickly, discreetly, and was willing to pay.
They sailed through the night, Wardes manning the steering wheel while Louise and Guiche slept. Vin could have slept as well, but that would have left no one to keep an eye on Wardes. Instead she burned brass, approached him, and started to talk.
"How long are you planning on staying up?" she asked.
He glanced her way, and Vin recognized the way he looked at her. When Louise looked at her, she focused on her face. Guiche's glances were closer to leers, both condescending and appreciative, and he leered at everybody that way. When Wardes looked at her, he always started with her hands, checking to see if she was armed.
That was something they had in common.
"Until we arrive. Travel is safest at night, and we could reach Newcastle by morning."
"And if there's trouble when we get there?"
He let out a sigh, staring straight ahead. "What are you doing, Vin?"
For a moment she was worried that he had noticed her Soothing him, but that was impossible. Louise didn't know about emotional Allomancy, so she couldn't have told him. It's the only secret I have left. If she pushed too hard anyone would know that they were being manipulated, but she was being subtle.
Which meant that she couldn't rely on brass alone. She looked away, as though angry and embarrassed but trying—poorly—to hide it. "I've been thinking. I ... don't like you."
He raised an eyebrow. "Really? I hadn't noticed."
"Shut up. I don't like you, and I don't have any real reason not to. More than that, considering what we're in the middle of, that shouldn't even matter."
He glanced her way once more. "Alright."
That's it? Alright? Hiding her frustration, she went on. "I think the issue is that I don't know you. I know the others in the group, but you just came out of nowhere and expect us to trust you."
"Her Highness Princess Henrietta appointed me to this task."
Vin rolled her eyes. "She appointed all of us to this task. That's not a convincing argument."
"You don't think highly of our Princess."
"I know her less than I know you. And the only thing I know about you is that you're engaged to Louise and spend most of your time trying to seduce a girl half your age."
Wardes fell silent for a moment, and Vin felt left in the dark. What was going through his head? What emotions should she make him feel? Guilt? Amusement? Irritation? His face was a closed book in a dead language in a locked room.
"Ah," he said slowly. "I think I understand what's going on. You're in love with her, aren't you?"
Vin raised an eyebrow. "Who, Louise?"
He nodded. "I should have recognized your jealousy sooner. It's nothing to be ashamed of, though inconvenient—"
"Before you go any further, I want you to know that if I were to break your jaw you wouldn't be able to cast spells anymore, and it would be pretty easy for me to throw you overboard and tell everyone you disappeared during the night."
"Noted. Do you plan murder contingencies for everyone you work with?"
"Only the ones I'm worried about."
He tipped his hat and bowed slightly. "Then I am honored to find myself in that select group."
Ah, amusement it is. She turned away scowling, hoping that was the reaction he was trying to provoke, and burned zinc. With tin, it was easy to notice the corners of his lips twitch upward in a smile.
"So what is the deal with you two anyway? You're not treating your engagement like a political arrangement, and I don't believe for a moment that you're being genuine."
"You first." He turned to face her. "I don't know you any more than you know me. What is your relationship with Louise?"
She glared at him. "I told you, I'm not—"
"You told me what you are not, not what you are. You accept the role of a servant in public, but I have never met a servant as outspoken as you. Officially you are her familiar, but as there has never before been a human familiar, that tells me nothing. Once more, Vin, what is she to you?"
Vin ... Vin didn't know. She often felt like a servant, washing Louise's clothes and running errands for her. Sometimes she felt like a trophy that Louise held up to show off to others. At other times, Vin even felt like a friend, as odd as that sounded, someone that Louise could talk to and confide in. More recently, though, things were just a mess.
She trusts me. What the hell am I supposed to do with that?
Fortunately, Vin had no reason to be honest with Wardes, so she told him a lie that he would be likely to believe. "Stability," she said. "I don't have to worry about being knifed in my sleep or where my next meal is coming from, and that's not something I can take for granted."
She Soothed away his skepticism, but the man still looked at her in confusion. "That's it?"
"That's it."
"A woman with your skillset could make a fortune doing ... literally anything else."
Vin shrugged. "That's my answer. Now it's your turn."
Wardes stared at her, and Vin didn't look away. He shook his head. "What a small minded creature you are. Your master is a legend made flesh, a prophecy fulfilled, and the destiny of the world, but you content yourself with ... nevermind."
Vin heard a note of anger in his voice, so she focused on that anger and Soothed that away too. "Legend?" she asked. She drew one of her glass daggers and displayed the glowing runes on her left hand. "Is that the legend of Gandalfr?"
"The legend of Gandalfr? There is no legend of Gandalfr, there is only the legend of Brimir and his four familiars."
Vin tried to piece together the scattered bits of information she had. "And you think that Louise is another Brimir?"
He gave her a flat look. "You speak his name as though he were some obscure myth, not the savior of mankind."
Vin shrugged, idly noting that Sazed would have been ecstatic to learn more about the world's religion. "Either way, the world doesn't seem to need another savior right now."
Wardes turned away from her in disgust. "You may live long enough to be proven wrong."
Vin took that as a dismissal, so she left him to his steering. Besides, she had learned all she needed to. She had been worried that Wardes was a pervert who was into little girls, but the truth wasn't nearly so bad. It turned out he was just a madman who thought that Louise was going to save the world.
But as she left, Kelsier's voice whispered in her mind. There's always another secret.
WWW
Newcastle stood at the edge of the world, wreathed in smoke and encircled by battleships. Even without tin, Vin could hear the armada of the Reconquista booming with thunder over the city. The four of them gathered at the bow of the ship, planning their next move.
"He's still alive," Wardes said. "The Reconquista would not waste gunpowder on a corpse. But I can't say how long he will last."
"So we have to hurry," Louise said, peering through a spyglass. "I didn't come all this way to fail."
Guiche squinted into the distance. "True, true. Tis no failure to die in glory. The poets will surely remember us. Though ... one of us should stay behind to inform said poets, preferably someone poetic."
"How much time do they have?" Vin asked.
"As I said, I cannot say," Wardes said. "I've been in skirmishes and a few battles, but no sieges. Could be months. Could be days. Though I can say that breaching castle walls is the most costly thing an army can do. It is common for the besieging force to merely pin down their foe so their enemy cannot harass weaker targets. It is also common to wait for the besieged supplies to run low and weaken them with hunger. But to assault a foe with such a disadvantage? No army would attempt such a feat without overwhelming force."
Louise put down the spyglass. "How much is overwhelming?"
Wardes' expression did not change. "A bit more than what you see. At this point, the Reconquista could win, but the cost would leave them vulnerable."
Louise fell silent for a moment. "We'll be fast. You and I shall ride in on your griffin's back and dart in before the traitorous Albion nobility even see us."
"They'll see us," he said. "And even if their canons miss us, their dragons won't. And even if their dragons miss us, the royalists will assume us to be enemies and kill us on sight."
Vin found herself nodding in agreement despite herself. This was a fool's errand from the beginning. The princess was a fool for sending Louise on this mission, and Louise was a bigger fool for accepting. The sooner Louise came to terms with that, the sooner they could go back to a place where no one was trying to kill them.
But ... but that would kill her. Going home would save Louise's life, but it would kill her, at least a little. She wanted to succeed for her princess and ... and for her friend more than she wanted life itself. It was stupid and reckless and extremely Louise.
"We could go on foot," Vin said. "If we stay under cover, they won't see us from the sky."
"They have ground forces," Wardes said. "Peasant soldiers with muskets serving under mageknights and as many demihumans as the Reconquista can afford. We can't see them from here, but expect a ground army to match the air navy."
"I could do it," she found herself saying. "If there's an army down there, no one will know everyone. I could disguise myself as a servant, and no one will know that I'm not supposed to be there." She didn't know a thing about wars, but she knew cons.
"There's no way that would work," Louise said. She looked up at Wardes and Vin thought she sounded frightened. "Is there?"
Wardes stroked his beard. "It might. They'll have sentries, but they'll be more on the lookout for royalist armies than lone spies. You should be able to blend in with the camp followers as long as you keep a low profile. The besieging war camp shouldn't give you too much difficulty. The surviving royalists will."
"Because they'll be looking out for assassins."
Wardes nodded. "If the prince dies, the royal line is finished."
Louise frowned. "Wait, that can't be right. I know for a fact that Princess Henrietta is cousins with Prince Wales, so that ought to make her, if not next in line, at least third or fourth."
"You are correct, but there would be complications, and Her Highness might not even choose to claim the throne. She would still need to deal with the Reconquista, the remaining royalists would have to be made aware of her intentions, and finally they would have to choose to support her. Before she could hope to rally the people of Albion to her cause, the Reconquista would have settled in."
"So why hasn't the Reconquista assassinated him already?" Vin asked.
The rest of the group looked at her as though she had asked something stupid and obvious. "That would be shameful," Louise said. "If the Reconquista defeats the royalists, they'll be able to claim Albion by right of conquest. But if they win dishonorably, that stigma will follow them for a thousand years. No one will lend money to them, no one will trade with them, no one will even acknowledge them."
"So they'd have to cover it up."
Louise sighed. "Yes, Vin. That's exactly what I'm saying. They'd need to cover it up."
"It would certainly embarrass them," Wardes said. "And that would make future diplomatic relations difficult, but their spoken creed is to conquer the whole of Halkegenia. That is not a declaration seeded in diplomacy. Moreso, the royalists see the rebels as traitors and seditionists, and will expect them to act dishonorably."
So they'll see me as an enemy assassin, Vin thought. She turned to Louise. "The princess asked you to deliver a letter. It should have her ... signature or seal or something to tell the prince it's from her, right?"
Louise looked down. "Well, yes, but I was hoping to give it to him myself. You know, as Princess Henrietta's ambassador."
"Louise must witness the mission fulfilled," Wardes said. "Louise, Her Highness trusts you completely. No one else here shares that honor. If you do not see this quest completed with your own eyes, the princess will have cause to doubt. Moreover, should the royalists kill you on sight that would be unacceptable, and should the Reconquista capture you and the princess' letter, that would be worse than failure."
"Do you have a better idea?" Vin snapped.
"I do," Louise said. She took a deep breath and stepped forward, pulling the ring off from her finger. "This is the Water Ruby, which Princess Henrietta has given to me which her mother the queen has given to her, and now I'm giving it to you, Vin. By this, Wales will know who sent you."
Her voice sounded formal, as though Louise were speaking in part of a ceremony. The ring was beautiful, eye catching, and undeniably expensive, something that Vin would never wear by choice. Though ... though Valette might. For a skaa, wealth was a liability, a lure for those stronger than you to kill you and take that wealth for themselves. For a noblewoman, wealth was status. And if Vin wanted the royalists to think she was too important to kill on sight, she would need all the status she could get.
"How is that a ruby if it's blue?" Guiche asked. "Wouldn't it be a sapphire instead?"
Louise gritted her teeth and glared at him. "Really? Do you mind?"
"I mean, sapphires can be any number of colors besides blue. It all comes down to the concentrations and levels of impurities found within the crystal. But if the corundum crystal is not red, then by definition it cannot—"
"Yes, Guiche, no one cares."
"I'm just saying that calling it the Water Sapphire would ..."
WWW
Vin sat in the crow's nest, twisting the ring around her finger as she waited for the sun to set. She hardly believed she was wearing it. It wasn't just frivolous, it was metal. An enemy allomancer could ... but there were no enemy allomancers. Just her.
The ladder creaked beneath her as Louise climbed up to her. "I figured," she said, settling down beside her, "that you came up here to be alone with your thoughts. Then I decided that your thoughts were probably horrible and I wouldn't trust them alone with a sage, let alone my familiar."
Vin tilted her head. Louise could come off as awfully blunt at times, but ... but there was always another secret. "What kind of thoughts did you think I was thinking?"
She shrugged. "Oh, you know. That everyone's going to stab you in the back as soon as you look away, that it would be better to cut and run while you still can. The usual." She paused and looked up at her. "Not that you would, of course, but you'd worry about it until your hair turned grey."
Grey hair. What a noble thing to worry about. Still, how quickly Louise dismissed the idea that Vin would abandon them ... well, she wouldn't, but that wasn't the sort of thing that someone should just assume.
She trusts me.
"That's not what I was thinking about," Vin said. "I was thinking about ..." She looked out to the impenetrable cloud of fog that encompassed the ship. Not mist. Fog. Wardes had spelled it into being to hide the ship, but even with tin it was as hard to see out of as she hoped it was to see into. The fog lacked the inviting tendrils, the haunting beauty that she was used to.
"What?" Louise prompted.
"What makes you so sure that I won't run away?"
Louise fell silent for a moment. "Will you?"
"Part of me wants to. Part of me always wants to, no matter where I am. To not be here. To just disappear." She turned to Louise. "But you didn't answer my question. Why are you so sure I won't abandon you?" Anyone will betray you.
"Oh boy," she said, sighing. "Okay, what do you know about magic?"
Vin cocked her head at that. "What does that have to do with anything?"
"Everything. See, most commoners think of magic as a mage waving a wand around and saying the right words, but that's only magic on the outside. It starts in the mind. The mage thinks fire, believes fire, and wills fire into being, and then ... reality submits.
"We live our lives by that philosophy. Why does the peasant clean the stables while the noble rides the horses? Because of money? No, if you use money to solve your problems, you will soon run out of money. Fear? Also no. Fear will make people run away from you more often than obey you. Will. A superior will and the willingness of others to submit to it."
Louise stared out into the distance for a moment and then shook her head. "At least, that's how my father explained it. I've never really managed to make it work with magic."
"So you think you're keeping me from leaving through sheer force of will?"
Louise shrugged. "Well, I'm convincing myself you won't leave through sheer force of will at least. Is it working?"
Vin smiled despite herself. "It must be. I'm still here, aren't I?"
Louise didn't laugh. Part of Vin had hoped that she would. "Why are you still here? Last night when you ... when you ran off, well, I've tried to be a good master, I have, but ..." She shook her head. "Ever since Fouquet, I thought, 'My familiar's a mage. If I could teach her how to carry herself and help her acquire a title, she could become a noblewoman.' And when the Princess gave me this mission, I thought that I might be able to knight you when we get back. But ever since your duel with Wardes—which you won—it's like you've been angry at me for some reason, and whenever we're in public you've been so quick to play the role of a peasant when we both know you can be better than that."
Vin, a noblewoman? She turned that idea over in her mind. She could play the part as long as the job required it, but it would only ever be a facade. And if she ever became a noblewoman in truth, well, what would Kelsier think?
"I never know when to run," she whispered. Reen did. He took her from one thieving crew to another, and whenever the money wasn't worth the risk, he left before trouble struck. He ran when their mother went insane and killed her baby sister, and years later, he ran and abandoned Vin as he always said he would.
Not Vin, though. When she knew Camon's crew was about to get in trouble, she stayed just a minute too long and would have died if Kelsier hadn't saved her. And in Kelsier's crew, well, the man's plan had been madness from the start. The smart thing would have been to run with the three thousand boxings Kelsier had given her. That's what Reen would have done. Instead, she followed Kelsier into Kredik Shaw.
Why had she stayed?
"I don't have anywhere else to go." She smiled bitterly. "Maybe I am a coward like you say."
Louise paled and she reached out with her hand as if to touch her before pulling it back. "I ... I didn't mean that. You act like one sometimes, but I know you're not, which doesn't make any sense and I just don't understand you most of the time. A coward wouldn't volunteer to sneak through an enemy war camp alone, which I don't like but I know that you have the best chance out of any of us, so ..." She grit her teeth in frustration. "I ... I shouldn't have called you that."
Vin looked at her. It was, quite nearly, an apology. "A war camp is nothing to worry about. I'm used to that sort of thing." Not that she had ever been in a war camp before or anywhere close to a war in her life. But it was a dense crowd of people where she could be anonymous, and that suited her. "But I should get going."
"Already? You're not going to wait until dark?"
Vin shook her head. "If everyone besides the people on watch have gone to bed, I'll stand out." If she needed to she could find a place to hide and wait until nightfall, but first she wanted to be able to blend in. "And Louise? While I'm gone, be careful. Please?"
Louise tilted her head. "About what? We're safe here. You're the one who's going into danger."
No one's ever safe. It's where you think you're safe that you need to watch out the most.
But Vin didn't say that. "Just be careful."
WWW
A/n It has been a long time since I last updated this story, over a year to be honest. But it's back, in large part due to my Patrons, Exiled Immortal, Prime 2.0, Sphinxes, Kelsey Bull, Hubris Prime, Apofatix, Janember, Yotam Bonneh, and Svistka! My editor Exiled Immortal especially, for not only reading through it and correcting typos, but for helping me plan out where this story is going, both in terms of plot and character.
Hopefully it won't be a year before my next update. See you then!