Brandon Sanderson - Shadows of Self

Open window. Wax grabbed a handful of pens from a desk before throwing himself out the window, a dozen stories up. Banknotes fluttered in the air, trailing behind Marks as he plummeted. Wax increased his weight, trying to fall faster, but he had nothing to Push against and the increased weight helped only slightly against air resistance. Marks still hit the ground before him, then Pushed away the coin he’d used to slow himself.

A pair of dropped pens—with metal nibs—Pushed ahead of himself into the ground was enough, barely, to slow Wax.

Marks leaped away, bounding out over some streetlamps. He bore no metal on his body that Wax could spot, but he moved a lot more slowly than he had earlier, and he trailed blood.

Wax followed him. Marks would be making for the Breakouts, a slum where the people still covered for him. They didn’t care that his robberies had turned violent; they celebrated that he stole from those who deserved it.

Can’t let him reach that safety, Wax thought, Pushing himself up over a lamppost, then shoving on it behind him to gain speed. He closed on his prey, who checked on Wax with a frantic glance over his shoulder. Wax raised one of the pens, gauging how risky it would be to try to hit Marks in the leg. He didn’t want a killing blow. This man knew something.

The slums were just ahead.

Next bound, Wax thought, gripping the pen. Bystanders stared up from the sidewalks, watching the Allomantic chase. He couldn’t risk hitting one of them. He had to—

One of those faces was familiar.

Wax lost control of his Push. Stunned by what he’d seen, he barely kept himself from breaking bones as he hit the street, rolling across cobbles. He came to a rest, mistcoat tassels twisted around his body.

He drew himself up on hands and knees.

No. Impossible. NO.

He scrambled across the street, ignoring a stomping black destrier and its cursing rider. That face. That face .

The last time he had seen that face, he had shot it in the forehead. Bloody Tan.

The man who had killed Lessie.

“A man was here!” Wax shouted, shoving through the crowd. “Long-fingered, thinning hair. A face almost like a bare skull. Did you see him? Did anyone see him?”

People stared at him as if he were daft. Perhaps he was. Wax raised his hand to the side of his head.

“Lord Waxillium?”

He spun. Marasi had stopped her motorcar nearby, and both she and Wayne were climbing out. Had she actually been able to tail him during his chase? No … no, he’d told her where he thought Marks would go.

“Wax, mate?” Wayne asked. “You all right? What did he do, knock you from the air?”

“Something like that,” Wax mumbled, glancing about one last time.

Rusts, he thought. The stress is digging into my mind.

“So he got away,” Marasi said, folding her arms, looking displeased.

“Not yet he didn’t,” Wax said. “He’s bleeding and dropping money. He’ll leave a trail. Come on.”

“I need you to stay behind as we go into those slums,” Wayne said, determined to impress solemnity into his voice. “It’s not that I don’t want your help. I do. It’s just going to be too dangerous for you. You need to stay where I know you’re safe. No arguments. I’m sorry.”

“Wayne,” Wax said, walking past. “Stop talking to your hat and get over here.”

Wayne sighed, patting his hat and then forcing himself to put it down and leave it in the motorcar. Wax was a right good fellow, but there were a lot of things he didn’t understand. Women for one. Hats for another.

Wayne jogged over to where Wax and Marasi peered into the Breakouts. It seemed a different world in there. The sky inside was strung with clotheslines, derelict bits of clothing dangling like hanged men. Wind blew out of the place, happy to escape, carrying with it uncertain scents. Food half cooked. Bodies half washed. Streets half cleaned.

The tall, compact tenements cast deep shadows even in the afternoon. As if this were the place dusk came for a drink and a chat before sauntering out for its evening duty.

“The Lord Mistborn didn’t want there to be slums in the city, you know,” Marasi said as the three of them entered. “He tried hard to prevent them from growing up. Built nice buildings for the poor, tried to make them last…”

Wax nodded, absently moving a coin across his knuckles as he walked. He seemed to have lost his guns somewhere. Had he bummed some coins off Marasi? It never was fair. When Wayne borrowed coins off folks, he got yelled at. He did forget to ask sometimes, but he always offered a good trade.

As they penetrated deeper into the Breakouts, Wayne lagged behind the other two. Need a good hat … he thought. The hat was important.

So he listened for some coughing.

Ah …

He found the chap nestled up beside a doorway, a ratty blanket draped over his knees. You could always find his type in a slum. Old, clinging to life like a man on a ledge, his lungs half full with various unsavory fluids. The old man hacked into a glove-wrapped hand as Wayne settled down on the steps beside him.

“What, now,” the man said. “Who are you?”

“What, now,” Wayne repeated. “Who are you?”

“I’m nobody,” the man said, then spat to the side. “Dirty outer. I ain’t done nothing.”

“I’m nobody,” Wayne repeated, taking his flask from the pocket of his duster. “Dirty outer. I ain’t done nothing.”

Good accent, that was. Real mumbly, a classic vintage, wrapped in a blanket of history. Closing his eyes and listening, Wayne thought he could imagine what people sounded like years ago. He held out the flask of whiskey.

“You trying to poison me?” the man asked. He clipped off words, left out half the sounds.

“You trying to poison me?” Wayne repeated, working his jaw as if his mouth were full of bits of rock he kept trying to chew. Some northern fields mix in this one, for sure. He opened his eyes and tipped the whiskey at the man, who smelled it, then took a sip. Then a swig. Then a gulp.

“So,” the man asked, “you an idiot? I’ve a son that’s an idiot. The real kind, that was born that way. Well, you seem all right anyway.”

“Well, you seem all right anyway,” Wayne said, standing up. He reached over to take the man’s old cotton cap off his head, then gestured toward the whiskey flask.

“In trade?” the man asked. “Boy, you are an idiot.”

Wayne pulled on the cap. “Could you say another word that starts with ‘h’ for me?”

“Huh?”

“Rusting wonderful,” Wayne said. He hopped back down the steps onto the street and ditched his duster in a cranny—and along with it his dueling canes, unfortunately. He kept his wooden knucklebones though.

The clothing underneath his duster was Roughs stock, not so different from what they wore in these slums. Buttoned shirt, trousers, suspenders. He rolled up the sleeves as he walked. The clothing was worn, patched in a few places. He wouldn’t trade it for the world. Took years to get clothing that looked right. Used, lived-in.

Be slow to trust a man with clothing that was too new. You didn’t get to wear new, clean clothing by doing honest work.

Wax and Marasi had paused up ahead, speaking to some old women with scarves on their heads and bundles in their arms. Wayne could almost hear what they were saying.

We don’t know nothing.

He came running past here mere moments ago, Wax would say. Surely you—