Mistborn #02 The Well of Ascension

convinced that she deserves to be happy at all. She has led a very confusing, difficult life."
    "How sure are you about this?"
    "I've raised a number of daughters, Your Majesty," Tindwyl said. "I understand the things of which I speak."
    "Daughters?" Elend asked. "You have children?"
    "Of course."
    "I just. . ." The Terrismen he'd known were eunuchs, like Sazed. The same couldn't be true for a woman like Tindwyl, of course, but he'd assumed that the Lord Ruler's breeding programs would have affected her somehow.
    "Regardless," Tindwyl said curtly, "you must make some decisions, Your Majesty. Your relationship with Vin is going to be difficult. She has certain issues that will provide more problems than you would find in a more conventional woman."
    "We've already discussed this," Elend said. "I'm not looking for a more 'conventional' woman. I love Vin."
    "I'm not implying that you shouldn't," Tindwyl said calmly. "I am simply giving you instruction, as I have been asked to do. You need to decide how much you're going to let the girl, and your relationship with her, distract you."
    "What makes you think I'm distracted?"
    Tindwyl raised an eyebrow. "I asked you about your success with Lord Venture this evening, and all you wanted to talk about was how Vin felt during the ride home."
    Elend hesitated.
    "Which is more important to you, Your Majesty?" Tindwyl asked. "This girl's love, or the good of your people?"
    "I'm not going to answer a question like that," Elend said.
    "Eventually, you may not have a choice," Tindwyl said. "It is a question most kings face eventually, I fear."
    "No," Elend said. "There's no reason that I can't both love Vin and protect my people. I've studied too many hypothetical dilemmas to be caught in a trap like that."
    Tindwyl shrugged, standing. "Believe as you wish, Your Majesty. However, I already see a dilemma, and I find it not at all hypothetical." She bowed her head slightly in deference, then withdrew from the room, leaving him with his books.

There were other proofs to connect Alendi to the Hero of Ages. Smaller things, things that only one trained in the lore of the Anticipation would have noticed. The birthmark on his arm. The way his hair turned gray when he was barely twenty and five years of age. The way he spoke, the way he treated people, the way he ruled .
    He simply seemed to fit .

29
    "TELL ME, MISTRESS," ORESEUR SAID, lying lazily, head on paws. "I have been around humans for a goodly number of years. I was under the impression that they needed regular sleep. I guess I was mistaken."
    Vin sat on a wall-top stone ledge, one leg up against her chest, the other dangling over the side of the wall. Keep Hasting's towers were dark shadows in the mists to her right and to her left. "I sleep," she said.
    "Occasionally." OreSeur yawned a deep, tongue-stretching yawn. Was he adopting more canine mannerisms?
    Vin turned away from the kandra, looking east, over the slumbering city of Luthadel. There was a fire in the distance, a growing light that was too large to be of man's touch. Dawn had arrived. Another night had passed, making it nearly a week since she and Elend had visited Straff's army. Zane had yet to appear.
    "You're burning pewter, aren't you?" OreSeur asked. "To stay awake?"
    Vin nodded. Beneath a light burn of pewter, her fatigue was only a mild annoyance. She could feel it deep within her, if she looked hard, but it had no power over her. Her senses were keen, her body strong. Even the night's cold wasn't as bothersome. The moment she extinguished her pewter, however, she'd feel the exhaustion in force.
    "That cannot be healthy, Mistress," OreSeur said. "You sleep barely three or four hours a day. Nobody—Mistborn, man, or kandra—can survive on a schedule like that for long."
    Vin looked down. How could she explain her strange insomnia? She should be over that; she no longer had to be frightened of the other crewmembers around her. And yet, no matter how exhausted she grew, she was finding sleep more and more difficult to claim. How could she sleep, with that quiet thumping in the distance?
    It seemed to be getting closer, for some reason. Or simply stronger? I hear the thumping sounds from above, the pulsings from the mountains . . .. Words from the logbook.
    How could she sleep, knowing that the spirit watched her from the mist, ominous and hateful? How could she sleep when armies threatened to slaughter her friends, when Elend's kingdom had been taken from him,