Mistborn #04 The Alloy of Law

he stumbled backward, holding his mouth.
    With Marasi mostly out of the way, Waxillium’s mind cleared, and he found himself able to move again. He shot Tarson, though he couldn’t bring himself to aim for the chest, not with Marasi stumbling nearby. He settled on dropping Tarson with a shot to the arm. Marasi raised her hand to her mouth in horror, watching him fall.
    “He’s over there!” Voices from behind, the three bandits he’d been fighting among the tables. An aluminum bullet split the air just beside him.
    “Hold on,” Waxillium said to Marasi, leaping forward and grabbing her around the waist. He raised his gun and shot the last bullet in his gun toward the doorway, hitting the masked leader of the Vanishers in the head.
    The man collapsed in a heap.
    Well, there goes that theory, Waxillium thought. Miles wouldn’t have fallen to a mere bullet. He was a Twinborn of a particularly dangerous variety.
    Tarson was rolling over, holding his arm and groaning. No time. Guns empty. Waxillium dropped the gun and Pushed on it while holding tightly to Marasi. The Push hurled the two of them into the air; a hail of bullets sprayed through the space where they’d been. Unfortunately, they missed Tarson, who was rolling on the floor.
    Marasi cried out, clinging to him as they flew up toward the brilliant chandeliers. Waxillium pushed off one of them, causing it to rock back and forth. That Push threw him and Marasi toward the nearby balcony, which was occupied by a group of cowering musicians.
    Waxillium landed hard on the balcony; he was off-balance from carrying Marasi, and hadn’t had time to judge the Push precisely. They rolled in a bundle of red and white fabric. When they came to a rest, Marasi clung to him, shaking and gasping for breath.
    He sat up, and held her for a moment. “Thank you,” she whispered. “Thank you.”
    “Don’t mention it,” he said. “That was very brave, stopping the bandit as you did.”
    “Seven out of ten kidnappings can be foiled by appropriate resistance on the part of the target,” she said, words tumbling out of her mouth. She squeezed her eyes closed again. “Sorry. That was just very, very unsettling.”
    “I—” He froze.
    “What?” she asked, opening her eyes.
    Waxillium didn’t respond. He rolled to the side, pulling loose from her grip as he noticed the blue lines moving to the left. Someone was coming up the steps to the balcony.
    Waxillium came up beside a large harp as the balcony door burst open to reveal two Vanishers—one with a rifle, the other with a pair of pistols. Waxillium increased his weight by tapping his metalmind, then heaved with a desperate flare of steel, Pushing against the harp’s metal mountings, nails, and strings. The instrument crashed into the wooden doorway and smashed the men against the wall. They slumped down, dropping to the stairs under the broken harp.
    Waxillium ran to check their vitals. Convinced they wouldn’t be dangerous any time soon, he grabbed the handguns and dashed back to the edge of the balcony, scanning the room below. The furniture he’d Pushed out of the way made a strange perfectly circular open space on the ballroom floor. Partygoers were making for the kitchens in increasingly large numbers. He looked for Wayne, but saw only the broken bodies of fallen bandits where he’d been.
    “Steris?” Marasi asked, crawling up beside him.
    “I’ll go after her right now,” Waxillium said. “Some men towed her outside, but they won’t have had time to…” He trailed off as he noticed a blur beside the far door. It stopped, and suddenly Wayne was lying on the ground, blood pooling around him. A bandit stood above him looking quite pleased with himself, holding a smoking pistol.
    Damn! Waxillium thought, feeling a spike of fear. If Wayne had been hit in the head …
    Steris or Wayne?
    She’ll be safe, he thought. They took her for a reason; they need her.
    “Oh no!” Marasi said, pointing at Wayne. “Lord Ladrian, is that—”
    “He’ll be all right if I can get to him,” Waxillium said, hastily shoving a pistol into Marasi’s hands. “Can you use one of these?”
    “I—”
    “Just start firing it if someone threatens you. I’ll come.” He leaped up onto the balcony railing. His way was mostly blocked by the chandeliers; he couldn’t make a direct jump to Wayne. He’d have to jump down, then up again, and bound to—
    No time. Wayne was dying.
    Go!
    Waxillium threw himself off the