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"So," Telden said, finishing off his wine "We are at a stale low on food down here, unless you've found a way to open those cans Even if you have, there's nothing you can do down here to help up above My guess is that unless you take the wine, we'll all end up starving to death in this cavern"

Vin sat back in her chair There has to be a way out--a chance to exploit this

However, it was incredibly unlikely that she'd be able to break through that door above She could h However, her steel and peould be gone, and she was out of metal vials

Telden's words, unfortunately, held a great deal of truth Even if Vin could survive in the cavern, she'd be stagnant and useless The siege would continue up above--she didn't even kno that was going--and the world would continue to die by Ruin's et out of the cavern Even if thatput into Yoed wine

Daator is far cleverer than we expected The ould certainly have been prepared with enough strength to knock out an Allomancer

However

Pewter s If she flared peith duralu the wine, would it perhaps burn away the poison and leave her awake? She could pretend to be unconscious, then escape above

It seemed like a stretch And yet, as she to do? Her food was al were slim She didn't knohat Yomen wanted of her--and Telden would be very unlikely to tell her--but he must not want her dead If that had been the case, he'd simply have left her to starve

She had a choice Either wait longer in the cavern, or gaht for just a moment, then made up her mind She reached for the bottle Even if her trick with pewter didn't work, she'd rather ga into a better situation up above

Telden chuckled "They did say that you were a decisive one That's rather refreshing--I've spent far too long with stuffy noblemen who take years to conored him She easily popped the cork off of the bottle, then raised it and took a swig The drugs began to take effect al her eyes droop, trying to give the i asleep Indeed, it was very difficult to re despite flared pewter

She sluht, then burned duralumin Her body flared with hyperenhanced pewter I of tiredness went away She aly Telden was chuckling "I'll be," he said to one of the servants "She actually went for it"

"You'd be dead if she hadn't, my lord," the servant said "We'd all be dead"

And then the duralumin ran out Her pewter disappeared with a puff, and with it went her i, which hadn't burned away It had been a long shot anyway

She barely heard her weapon click as it slipped froers and hit the floor Then, she fell unconscious

Once Ruin was free froly--but iic spike was difficult no matter what the circus, he apparently began with people who already had a tenuous grip on reality Their insanity made them more open to his touch, and he could use them to spike more stable people Either way, it's ied to spike King Penrod, ruling Luthadel at the tiood example of this

51

ELEND FLEW THROUGH THE MISTS He'd never quite been able to e Vin's horse shoe trick So fro each horseshoe back up behind her after she used it To Elend, the process looked like a cyclone of potentially lethal chunks of metal with Vin at the center

He dropped a coin, then Pushed hiiven up on the horseshoe method after four or five failed atteet it down--she'd apparently figured it out on her own, needing only about a half hour's practice to perfect it

But, well, that was Vin

ElendCopper clips, the smallest of the old imperial coins, worked perfectly for his purposes--particularly since he was apparently much more powerful than other Mistborn Each of his Pushes carried him farther than they should have, and he really didn't use thatdistance

It felt good to be away He felt free as he plunged down fro darkness, then flared pewter and landed with a round in this particular valley was relatively free of ash--it had drifted, leaving a small corridor where it only came up to his e

A , rather than one of his white uniforms It seemed appropriate; besides, he'd never really had a chance to be a true Mistborn Since discoverin1g his powers, he'd spent his life at war There wasn't all thatabout in the darkness, particularly not with Vin around to do it better

I can see why Vin would find this intoxicating, he thought, dropping another coin and bounding between two hilltops Even with the stress of Vin's capture and the threat to the eh the et about the wars, the destruction, and the responsibility

Then, he landed, ash co up to nearly his waist He stood for a fewdown at the soft black powder He couldn't escape it Vin was in danger, the e It was his job to fix these things--that was the burden he'd taken upon himself when he'd become e a trail of ash fluttering in the mists behind hi better luck in Urteau, he thought He orried about his chances with Fadrex, and the Central Dorain in the Urteau cache if they were going to plant enough food for the co winter

He couldn't worry about that now He simply had to count on his friends to be effective Elend's job was to do so to help Vin He couldn't just sit and wait in the cas And yet, he didn't dare try to assassinate Yomen--not after the man had tricked both of them so cleverly