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Only for a ti

Itthis that atiuod However, it is necessary to understand that e said "body" we generally meant "power" As my y are actually coe state from one to another It odhood would be manifest within the world in physical form Ruin and Preservation were not nebulous abstractions They were integral parts of existence In a way, every object that existed in the world was composed of their power

Atiu composed of half Ruin and half Preservation--as, say, a rock would be--atium was completely of Ruin The Pits of Hathsin were crafted by Preservation as a place to hide the chunk of Ruin's body that he had stolen away during the betrayal and imprison those crystals, for they would have regrown eventually--in a few hundred years--and continued to deposit atium, as the place was a natural outlet for Ruin's trapped power1

When people burned atiu upon the power of Ruin--which is, perhaps, why atiu machines They didn't use up this power, however, but siet of atiuin to coalesce again--just as the power at the Well of Ascension would return there again after it had been used

78

THIS IS, SAZED THOUGHT, without a doubt, the oddest dungeon I have ever been in

Granted, it was only the second time he had been imprisoned Still, he had observed several prisons in his lifeties This one, however, consisted only of a hole in the ground with an iron grate covering the top Sazed scrunched down inside of it, stripped of his s craht One without bones, perhaps? What would a kandra without bones be like? A pile of goo? Or, perhaps, a pile of muscles?

Either way, this prison had not been meant to hold a man--particularly not one as tall as Sazed He could barely rate, but it was secure A large lock held it in place

He wasn't certain how long he had been in the pit Hours? Perhaps even days They still hadn't given hih a member of the Third Generation had poured some water on hi on the cloth of his robes to assuage his thirst

This is silly, he thought, not for the first ti, and I'm in prison? He was the final Keeper, the Announcer He should be up above, recording events

Because, truth be told, he was beginning to believe that the world would not end He had accepted that so over and protecting mankind He was ion--not because it was perfect, but because he would rather believe and have hope

The Hero was real Sazed believed that And he had faith in her

He had lived with Kelsier and had helped the man He had chronicled the rise of the Church of the Survivor during the first years of its developes with Tindwyl and taken it upon himself to announce Vin as the one who fulfilled the prophecies But it was only recently that he'd started to have faith in her Perhaps it was his decision to be so fear of the ending that seemed to looardless, somehow, from the chaos, he drew peace

She would come She would preserve the world However, Sazed needed to be ready to help And that rate The lock was of fine steel, the grate itself of iron He reached up tentatively, touching the bars, draining a bit of his weight and putting it into the iron Ihter In Ferucheh to hold a Ferucherate as a metalmind--it wasn't portable, and if he had to flee, he'd leave behind all of the power he'd saved Yet, what good would it be to simply sit in the pit and wait?

He reached up wit1h the other hand, touching the steel lock with one finger Then, he began to fill it as well, draining his body of speed He instantly began to feel lethargic, as if his every --was h some thick substance each time he moved

He stayed that way He had learned to enter a kind of meditative trance when he filledhimself sickly, weak, slow, and dull-minded When he could, it was better to simply

Drift

He wasn't certain how long the uard came to pour water on hio and huddle down, pretending to sleep But, as soon as the guard withdrew, he would reach back up and continue to fill the metalminds

More tiain, then waited expectantly for the shower of water

"When I sent you back to save rowled, "this wasn't exactly what I had inupward, and was surprised to see a canine face looking through the grate "TenSoon?" Sazed asked

The kandra grunted and stepped back Sazed perked up as another kandra appeared She wore a delicate True Body made of wood, y and almost inhuman And, she held soroith his dog's voice He had apparently switched back to the wolfhound, which h the sometimes steep and narrow tunnels of the Homeland would have been difficult