Moonlight walked up to them, nodding toward another of the plates. “You’re talking about a bomb? Well, it seems they have one — look at this.”
Marasi and Wax walked over, finding another plate with a list of underground disturbances. It was labeled with the words “Underground weapon tests, tracked using seismograph.”
“They’ve developed an underground base beneath the city,” Maraga said. “It’s where they hide. Lord Mayor Entrone is involved, is probably even one of their leaders. Some of the caverns seem to be weapons testing locations, but others are bunkers they’re preparing for some reason and using as a headquarters.”
“They stopped the tests recently,” Moonlight said. “Wonder why?”
“Well…” Maraga said. “They know it works. I mean, they’re well past their go date.”
“Go date?” Marasi asked, feeling cold.
“Stolen internal memos,” Maraga said, pointing to a plate. “Don’t know how he got them. Listing target dates for project completion. The weapon was supposed to be detonated two weeks ago.” Maraga slumped back down onto the steps. “They killed him the day before that. I thought for sure the end would come soon after …
“I…” She buried her head in her hands. “I know I should have published this. I’m a coward. In the end, I’m a coward. I’ve been hunkered up here, waiting for the ash to fall, haven’t I? Rusts. I was convinced no one would listen … Convinced it was too late…”
“What is done, or not done, is past,” Wax said, firm. “We have the information now. And there’s still time to stop this.”
“Wax,” Marasi hissed, taking his arm. “They have a bomb, and are planning — as far as we can determine — to detonate it in Elendel. They would have done it already, if they could figure out how to get it into the city.”
Maraga nodded. “Their self-propelled weapon — the rocket, they call it — is having difficulties. Fuel might be the problem. It’s what Tobal was working on for them before he realized what they were planning…” She stood up and steeled herself. “I need to show you one more thing.” She hurried to some boxes and dug through them as Moonlight unabashedly took rubbings of the plates.
Maraga dug out an evanotype photo. “The crowning jewel,” she said softly. “My best piece of evidence. The above-the-fold photo for the story I’ll never actually write…”
Marasi took it, frowning at Wax, who joined her. It depicted an ashen landscape. In color.
Marasi gasped softly, looking at the stark orange sky, the floating ash, the remnants of a ruined city in the distance. That looked … kind of like Elendel, though the ash was heaped so high, obscuring all but the tops of the smoldering, broken buildings and jagged destroyed walls.
“How…” Marasi said. “How can you have a picture of the end of the world?”
“They didn’t have evanotypes in the Survivor’s day,” Wax said, looking closely. “The colors are remarkable. Did someone take an old photo and paint onto it?”
“I don’t know,” Maraga said. “But it seems like a picture of … of what is going to happen. After he found this, Tobal started to get really scared. He barely stayed during our last visits. I think he mostly just huddled in his rooms until they got him. Like … like I’ve been doing.”
The basement fell silent, even Wayne sensing the mood and covering up any snickering at his funny pictures. Marasi felt a mounting horror at the sight of that picture. She’d heard Wax talk about a bomb, knew what the enemy was trying to build. Laying it out in stark depiction, however, changed it from abstract to concrete.
This was what they wanted to do. Wipe out everything she loved. Leave rubble and ash in its place. These were bigger stakes by far than any investigation she’d ever done. And the implications of it left her disquieted on a profound level.
She turned around, looking at the plates reflecting the calm electric light. Something ancient. Something new. Just like the picture Wax handed back to her.
A door opened upstairs.
The locks had been fastened, but that didn’t stop whoever had arrived. Wayne scrambled to his feet, hands going to his dueling canes as a single set of footsteps crossed the wooden floor up above.
Wax slid a gun from its holster and positioned himself to watch the steps. A figure descended onto the stairs. A woman with dark hair and a rugged build that seemed in conflict with her small nose and prim lips. She wore a suit: slacks, buttoned white shirt, jacket and cravat.
Telsin. Wax’s sister, leader of the Set. She wasn’t armed, at least not in a way that Marasi could make out. And she didn’t seem to mind that Wax had a gun pointed at her head while Wayne backed away, muttering.
“An address,” Telsin said. “The number on the back of the envelope was a rusting address? Do you know how many hours we wasted tearing into lockers at train stations?”
34
Marasi immediately reached for an Allomantic grenade, charging one silently in her pocket. Wax edged forward, gun on his sister. Wayne had scrambled back from the steps and was muttering to himself, hopping from one foot to the other. He looked around as if he expected enemies to come bursting in through the walls.
Last time they’d seen Telsin, she had betrayed them to the Set. She’d nearly gotten Wax killed, and in return Wayne had fired a shotgun blast at her chest. The first time he’d fired a gun in … well, Marasi didn’t know how long.
Telsin had healed, however, vanishing from the bloodied snows where Wayne had left her. She was a Hemalurgist, with at least the power of a Bloodmaker — like Wayne. She had shown hints of two other powers, but it was possible the members of the Set switched out their spikes to gain different Metallic Arts. Regardless, she apparently had enough abilities now that she didn’t seem the least bit concerned about facing them alone. Rusts.
“This is marvelous,” Telsin said, glancing around the basement. “Remarkable how many of our secrets he managed to sneak out, considering. Who would have thought our greatest danger wasn’t armies, constables, or even you, Waxillium? It was a miserable, bald old chemist.”
“Tobal was a good man!” Maraga said, and ducked behind Wax as Telsin looked toward her.
“Oh, you can lower the gun, Waxillium,” Telsin said, settling down on the steps. “The idiot over there will tell you how effective shooting me was.”
“Felt good,” Wayne said. “Does it need to do more than that? Here, Wax. Hand me a gun. I’ll have at it a few more times.”
Wax didn’t move, and Telsin rolled her eyes. They all stood there, Marasi’s grenade vibrating softly in her fingers as it absorbed her power. What now? They were being played, obviously. But how? Would the Set’s leader come to see them as a simple distraction?
“Tell us what the Set is planning,” Marasi said.
“No,” Telsin replied.
“Oh,” Wayne said, perking up. “Does this mean I can make her talk? On a scale of one to broken, how much do you fancy your kneecaps, Telsin?”
“I’ll heal in seconds, Wayne,” Telsin said.
“Not if we yank out the spikes,” Wayne snapped.
“Which would kill me,” Telsin said. “I’m sure that will give you so much information.”
“Well,” Wayne said, “breaking some pieces off you will still hurt, Telsin. I know a thing or two about that part.”
“Actually,” she said, “it won’t hurt. Did you know that a Feruchemist can store their pain in a metalmind? Oh, and you won’t be able to remove mine from me. We’ve learned better how to hide those. So torture me if you want, Wayne. I’ll find it boring, but nothing more.”