The Hero of Ages

'The most important thing for you to understand is that they can be beaten. We'll do it today. Don't let yourselves become intimidated! Fight with coordination, keep your heads, and I promise you that we will survive.'

The soldier captains stood in a small cluster, looking at Venture. They didn't cheer at the speech, but they did seem a little more confident. They moved off to pass on Venture's instructions to their men.

Fatren approached the emperor quietly. 'If your count is correct, they outnumber us five to one.'

Venture nodded.

'They're bigger, stronger, and better trained than we are.'

Venture nodded again.

'We're doomed, then.'

Venture finally looked at Fatren, frowning, black ash dusting his shoulders. 'You're not doomed. You have something they don't-something very important.'

'What's that?'

Venture met his eyes. 'You have me.'

'My lord emperor!' a voice called from atop the bulwark. 'Koloss sighted!'

They already call to him first, Fatren thought. Fatren wasn't certain whether to be insulted or impressed.

Venture immediately jumped up to the top of the bulwark, using his Allomancy to cross the distance in a quick bound. Most of the soldiers stooped or hid behind the top of the fortification, keeping a low profile despite the distance of their enemies. Venture, however, stood proud in his white cape and uniform, shading his eyes, squinting toward the horizon.

'They're setting up camp,' he said, smiling. 'Good. Lord Fatren, prepare the men for an assault.'

'An assault?' Fatren asked, scrambling up behind Venture.

The emperor nodded. 'The koloss will be tired from marching, and will be distracted by making camp. We'll never have a better opportunity to attack them.'

'But, we're on the defensive!'

Venture shook his head. 'If we wait, they'll eventually whip themselves into a blood frenzy, then come against us. We need to attack, rather than just wait to be slaughtered.'

'And abandon the bulwark?'

'The fortification is impressive, Lord Fatren, but ultimately useless. You don't have the numbers to defend the entire perimeter, and the koloss are generally taller and more stable than men. They'll just take the bulwark from you, then hold the high ground as they push down into the city.'

'But-'

Venture looked at him. His eyes were calm, but his gaze was firm and expectant. The message was simple. I am in charge now. There would be no more arguing.

'Yes, my lord,' Fatren said, calling over messengers to pass the orders.

Venture stood watching as the messenger boys dashed off. There seemed to be some confusion among the men-they weren't expecting to attack. More and more eyes turned toward Venture, standing tall atop the bulwark.

He really does look like an emperor, Fatren thought despite himself.

The orders moved down the line. Time passed. Finally, the entire army was watching. Venture pulled out his sword and held it high in the ash-scattered sky. Then, he took off down the bulwark in an inhumanly quick dash, charging toward the koloss camp.

For a moment, he ran alone. Then, surprising himself, Fatren gritted his teeth against shaking nerves and followed.

The bulwark exploded with motion, the soldiers charging with a collective yell, running toward death with their weapons held high.

Holding the power did strange things to my mind. In just a few moments, I became familiar with the power itself, with its history, and with the ways it might be used.

Yet, this knowledge was different from experience, or even ability to use that power. For instance, I knew how to move a planet in the sky. Yet, I didn't know where to place it so that it wouldn't be too close, or too far, from the sun.

2

As always, Tensoon's day began in darkness. Part of that was due, of course, to the fact that he didn't have any eyes. He could have created a set-he was of the Third Generation, which was old, even for a kandra. He had digested enough corpses that he had learned how to create sensory organs intuitively without a model to copy.

Unfortunately, eyes would have done him little good. He didn't have a skull, and he had found that most organs didn't function well without a full body-and skeleton-to support them. His own mass would crush eyes if he moved the wrong way, and it would be very difficult to turn them about to see.

Not that there would be anything to look at. TenSoon moved his bulk slightly, shifting inside his prison chamber. His body was little more than a grouping of translucent muscles-like a mass of large snails or slugs, all connected, somewhat more malleable than the body of a mollusk. With concentration, he could dissolve one of the muscles and either meld it with another one, or make something new. Yet, without a skeleton to use, he was all but impotent.

He shifted in his cell again. His very skin had a sense of its own-a kind of taste. Right now, it tasted the stench of his own excrement on the sides of the chamber, but he didn't dare turn off this sense. It was one of his only connections to the world around him.

The 'cell' was actually nothing more than a grate-covered stone pit. It was barely large enough to hold his mass. His captors dumped food in from the top, then periodically poured water in to hydrate him and wash his excrement out through a small drainage hole at the bottom. Both this hole and those in the locked grate above were too small for him to slide through-a kandra's body was supple, but even a pile of muscles could be squeezed only so small.

Most people would have gone mad from the stress of being so confined for. . he didn't even know how long it had been. Months? But TenSoon had the Blessing of Presence. His mind would not give in easily.

Sometimes he cursed the Blessing for keeping him from the blissful relief of madness.

Focus, he told himself. He had no brain, not as humans did, but he was able to think. He didn't understand this. He wasn't certain if any kandra did. Perhaps those of the First Generation knew more-but if so, they didn't enlighten everyone else.

They can't keep you here forever, he told himself. The First Contract says. .

But he was beginning to doubt the First Contract-or, rather, that the First Generation paid any attention to it. But, could he blame them? TenSoon was a Contract-breaker. By his own admission, he had gone against the will of his master, helping another instead. This betrayal had ended with his master's death.

Yet, even such a shameful act was the least of his crimes. The punishment for Contract-breaking was death, and if TenSoon's crimes had stopped there, the others would have killed him and been done with it. Unfortunately, there was much more at stake. TenSoon's testimony-given to the Second Generation in a closed conference-had revealed a much more dangerous, much more important, lapse.

TenSoon had betrayed his people's secret.

They can't execute me, he thought, using the idea to keep him focused. Not until they find out who I told.

The secret. The precious, precious secret.

I've doomed us all. My entire people. We'll be slaves again. No, we're already slaves. We'll