ᴛʜᴇꜱᴇ ᴀʀᴇ ᴛʜᴇ ᴅᴀʏꜱ ᴛʜᴀᴛ ʙɪɴᴅ ʏᴏᴜ ᴛᴏɢᴇᴛʜᴇʀ, ꜰᴏʀᴇᴠᴇʀ - H&S

Nico wished this was simpler. He wished that he had been born into a situation where his sister wasn’t targeted because of who their father was. He wished he had learned Allomancy from Bianca instead of from her killer. He wished he had never been turned into a weapon, because the Allomancy he had been taught to use was probably going to kill him if he wasn’t careful. He didn’t know how to burn. He didn’t know how to do the most basic of things, if Kelsier were to be believed. This was… this was an impossible challenge. Kelsier was coming at it like he could make something of it. Like the impossible was just another hurtle that he could jump over, not a dead end. For Nico, this seemed like a dead end. If he didn’t learn to burn soon, what then? Would Kelsier go back on his promise? Would he kill him for being an inconvenience? Nico had always treasured promises. He hoarded them like a dragon hoarded gold, and he noticed if any of them was broken, even if it was something small. He kept his own promises to the absolute best of his abilities. He had promised to kill Kelsier… he glanced over at the man, discomfort flooding through him once more at the fact that the Survivor was still alive and well.
“I don’t think I can do it,” Nico said after a long moment, falling to his knees like a puppet with cut strings. He bowed his head, half waiting for a dagger to slice through his spinal cord. He was… he was so tired. He wanted to be able to do this, he wanted to prove that he could… he bit his lip, trying to stop tears from falling. He wasn’t going to cry about this. He couldn’t afford to cry about this. He just… he had to keep trying. Keep trying or admit defeat and accept death.
“I’ve wasted enough of your time. I’m… I apologize.”

Nico didn’t know how to keep moving forward. He saw no hope ahead of him. He had been driven by anger and vengeance, and then he had failed at his one goal. He had to find a new goal, but he kept forbidding himself from doing that. No matter how many promises Kelsier made, Nico was almost certain that he was going to kill him eventually. He couldn’t have an enemy running around knowing all his secrets, could he? And yet he had promised that he wasn’t going to keep Nico locked up forever. Unless he was planning on turning Nico into a weapon that wouldn’t disobey him, Nico had no idea how this was going to work out.
He was trying. Trying was the only thing he could think to do that might keep him alive another day, keep him alive to see a sunset and watch the mist curl over the horizon until it covered Luthadel. Nico liked the mist. His room didn’t have a window, so it wasn’t as though he could really watch it when it took root in the city, but he liked to imagine it. It was peaceful in a way that nothing else was. The Skaa hid from it, and the streets were as empty as they could be. There were, of course, plenty of Skaa who had to stay out in it, but even they were quiet, as though not speaking could prevent the mist from hurting them. There were no screams. There were no sounds of chatter. Nico felt like he could exist without the world crashing in on him, if only for a few moments. The moments the mist poured in were the only peaceful moments Nico got with Minos. The days were as full as the nights, but he was allowed to watch as the sun set… it didn’t matter that he couldn’t see it anymore. He still felt the quiet relief of peace.
As soon as Kelsier spoke, Nico found himself on his feet, automatically obeying. This wasn’t a break. This was failure. This was, quite possibly, execution. Nico tried not to trudge as he waited for Kelsier to lead the way back. He tried not to betray the squirming uncertainty in his stomach. He had to stay dignified. He had to. Even if the tear tracks through the grime on his face gave him away.

---
Nico wasn’t sure if their last session had been a success or a failure. He was fairly certain that Kelsier was going to stop believing that he was trying if he didn’t manage to burn soon. It wasn’t that he wasn’t trying, it was just… he had no idea how to go about burning. He was trying to think about it as Kelsier had described it, but… it was just hard to fathom. It was hard to imagine burning when he couldn’t remember ever having done it before. He had been taught to push his Allomancy to the limit no matter what. If he wasn’t bowled over by the time he let the metal extinguish, he wasn’t pushing hard enough. Though Nico had never heard of being a savant, he was well on his way to being one in multiple different metals. Perhaps, he would come to learn, that was exactly what Minos had been hoping for. Perhaps that would have made Nico a better weapon. It didn’t matter what his life was like outside of his Allomancy. It never had. The only useful thing Nico had to give to the world was his power. He was Mistborn. He could help the Lord Ruler. He could help the nobility. Minos had been wrong. Nico had been constructed to be of maximum damage to everyone he encountered.
Was it possible for Kelsier to defuse a weapon of mass destruction? It seemed unlikely. And… if he managed to do it, what would he do with all of the pieces? Somehow, Nico doubted that he would be allowed to fit those things together on their own.
Nico had to admit that he was already getting tired of training. It was frustrating, and he kept failing. He hadn’t even failed this much in front of Minos.
All there was left to do was wait until Kelsier came to rescue him. Wait for Kelsier to realize there was nothing in Nico’s head worth rescuing. That anything he touched could be rebuilt, if Kelsier decided to break his promise after all.

Nico wasn’t sure whether to expect a knock or not. Kelsier seemed to have decided on a training schedule, but Nico had learned from months with Minos that a training schedule was more or less a lie. If Minos knocked on his door telling him it was time to train, he had best be ready to train, even if he hadn’t slept in almost a week. Minos told him keeping him on his toes was his way of training him to stay alive. Perhaps it was. Perhaps it had also made Nico more desperate. Perhaps it had made it easier to train him to flare rather than to burn. Nico didn’t know for sure if he trusted Kelsier yet, but the more time he spent with him, the more critical he found himself of Minos. There were things that Minos had done that were wrong. That even the Survivor of Hathsin, the cruelest man Nico had ever even heard of, would never do. The thought made Nico shudder, and he curled in on himself, letting the charcoal drop back down to his side. The drawing he’d been working on was almost unrecognizable, but he was trying. He couldn’t seem to get any of the shapes right. Perhaps because he was drawing Minos from memory. Perhaps because he was trying to draw the Minos he had respected. He was coming to realize that he had never really respected Minos. He had only ever feared him. There was no kind version of the man, at least not one Nico had seen.
And then there was a knock and Nico froze, his thoughts whirring together. This wasn’t a training night, at least not based on the way training had gone the past several nights. Perhaps Kelsier was getting impatient. He would soon learn that Nico was useless. He couldn’t learn how to burn, no matter how hard he tried.
“Come in,” Nico said after a moment, not moving to open the door. It didn’t’ matter if he had. They had discovered that the rooms locked from the outside, and that it was much easier to lock Nico in and have a guard than it was to just have one guard who could be overpowered depending on how on top of his game Nico was. The point was, he couldn’t open the door himself anyway.

It hadn’t actually occurred to Nico to plan an escape. He didn’t think he would get very far, and even if he managed to escape, what would he do? He couldn’t go back to his father. The Inquisitors were out looking for him because of Minos’ death. If he ran away, Kelsier’s crew would be after him, too. The only reason he had survived on his own was because of how deep his desire for vengeance burned. He had kept himself alive and away from Inquisitors because he knew he needed to kill Kelsier before he allowed himself to die. He had failed that task, and with the absence of that fire to push him forward… in truth, he didn’t know what he would do. He didn’t want to admit that he might not be able to survive, but it was the truth. Without a purpose, what was a person? Nico had been taught that skaa didn’t have a purpose if they were allowed to think for themselves, but Kelsier’s crew had proven that wrong from the very first day. He may not have understood the skaa very well, but he was beginning to see the differences between Minos’ words and the truth as Nico saw it. Changing the way he understood the world was difficult, but ultimately more worthwhile in his opinion than learning how to burn. Now that he had discovered that he wouldn’t die from not using Allomancy, he found there were days when he would really rather not use it at all. Though… his body seemed to crave it more than other people’s did. Nico didn’t see anything wrong with that, at least not yet.
“Yes,” Nico murmured, brushing his charcoal-stained fingers off on his pants. He was up in less than a second, following Kelsier out the door. He didn’t feel like training, but he still couldn’t make himself deny any of Kelsier’s requests. They were too similar to orders, and he couldn’t seem to untrain his mind from those, either.

Nico followed Kelsier as he always did, head lowered, eyes fixed on the ground as he trailed behind him. He didn’t know what to expect, but he had fallen into something of a rhythm when it came to training. He would do as much as he could. He would push himself until there was nowhere else to push, and then he would push even further. Nothing ever came of it, of course. To Kelsier, it would probably seem like he wasn’t trying at all. Deep down, though, Nico wanted to burn. He wanted to experience what Kelsier said most Allomancers did. He wanted that easy clarity, that version of Allomancy that wasn’t painful anymore. It never came to him.
They didn’t turn left where they usually turned. Then they didn’t turn right where they had the very first night. There were a couple of spots where Nico was used to training, but they didn’t move towards any of them. Was Kelsier taking him somewhere new? Part of Nico wanted to ask, but it was overwhelmed by the part of him that was still terrified to ask questions in training. If Kelsier wanted him to know something, he would either tell him, or Nico would be forced to figure it out on his own. Asking questions was just showing weakness.

Nico didn’t know to whom Kelsier was referring. He knew he had a tendency to be quiet. He observed, especially when it came to the crew. He hadn’t had the chance to observe much, though. When he had guards, they were always on the other side of the door. Sometimes they talked to him, but most of the time they were quiet. Nico liked it best when Hammond or Sazed were on guard. They were the most talkative, and they always had interesting things to say. Sazed kept trying to get him to try a religion, but Nico hadn’t given him enough to go off of to find one he might actually be able to believe in. In truth, Nico didn’t think there was any faith out there for him. He had grown up believing in the doctrine of the Lord Ruler, but the more time he had spent with Kelsier and the crew, the more he was convinced that it was a lie. Minos had never spent very much time talking about it except to insist that the Lord Ruler and all of his nobles were superior to the skaa by blood. They were blessed and changed because they had been the ones to stand by the Lord Ruler’s side and act as his friends when nobody else would. Nico didn’t think that mattered. He was beginning to learn that whatever the differences, the skaa weren’t inferior to the nobility. They were perhaps a little dirtier and rougher around the edges, but they were no less intelligence, and certainly no less organized and civilized. It was just… a different kind of civilization than the one Nico had grown up in. There was more camaraderie here.
“Are you talking about Lestibournes?” Nico asked after a moment, tilting his head. Of the crew, Spook was the one who listened the most. He never took guard duty, but he had heard the others around him speak to Spook when Nico hadn’t heard anyone else there. Spook was the most ghostlike of the crew. He was the one who spent the most time observing, which meant… what? Nico needed to watch out for him?
“Or are you talking about me?” he asked, pausing to think for another long moment. He couldn’t argue and say he wasn’t quiet, but it wasn’t always because he was listening. More often than not it was because he was trying to get out of his head, not deeper into it.
Nico glanced at Kelsier, then took the vial from him. He didn’t know what to expect, but in the past it had been vials with all of the metals. He thought it would be the same this time, but as he tipped the vial back towards his lip, it quickly became clear that it wasn’t. Just tin. Okay… Nico flared it for a moment before he extinguished it so he could pay full attention to what Kelsier was saying. Look… up? What did that have to do with anything?
Eyes cast towards the sky, Nico shook his head slightly.
“All I see is the mist, and the spires of a building,” he told Kelsier softly, shame settling in his stomach. He knew there was something he was supposed to see. And he hadn’t been told to burn, so he was afraid he needed to figure it out without Allomancy. He didn’t know what the price for failing would be.

As similar as Nico and Kelsier were, they were fundamentally different people. Kelsier would never give up on his search for vengeance. Nico already had. He didn’t want to admit that he had, but he had already failed to kill Kelsier once. He wasn’t going to try again. The most he could hope for was a chance to escape and live his own life. Maybe he would flee to a different town and try to find work. Maybe he would be able to use his Allomancy to do something useful. He wouldn’t try to go back to his father. He had failed to avenge Bianca’s death. Hades would have nothing to say to him, because he wasn’t the one who was supposed to survive. Between the two of them, Bianca had been the more useful one. She had the temperament and the power to do great things, and Nico had ruined that by not protecting her. By not avenging her. Hades would say that Bianca was looking down at him from the afterlife and cursing his name, but part of Nico didn’t care. He wanted to be free from being someone else’s weapon. It had been Hades first, until Nico had failed. Then it had been Minos until he had pushed a little bit too hard. Now it was Kelsier, even if he maintained that he wasn’t going to make a weapon out of Nico. It was the only thing that made sense. Why would you train a potential enemy unless you thought you could aim them in the direction you wanted them to attack?
“Spook,” Nico replied, giving a small nod at the boy’s nickname. He hadn’t been sure he was allowed to use the nickname. He had heard one or two people refer to Spook as Lestibournes, so that was what he had assumed was proper. Who was he to call the boy by a nickname? He wasn’t a friend. He was scarcely more than a prisoner. “Your Coppercloud calls him Lestibournes. Lord Breeze does as well, at times.” It was weird referring to the Soother by a noble title, but Nico didn’t know how else to show respect. If he didn’t show respect properly, he could be killed. Well… maybe not if Kelsier kept his word, but if Nico had been under Minos or Hades’ tutelage, undoubtedly. He may have been scolded first, but if he had made a big enough fool of the family… he shuddered, trying to push the thought as far away as possible.
“I don’t know if I’m really that quiet,” Nico replied quietly, following Kelsier’s gaze up to the sky. There was nothing to see there other than swirling bits of mist and ash. There wasn’t even a moon to cut through all of the mist and ash. The city felt… dark. Darker than usual, like a veil had settled over it. He wasn’t surprised there was nobody on the street tonight. If you could get shelter on a night like this, most people did.
“What do you mean by that?” Nico asked, blinking and looking up again. There was nothing. Was this a test? Nico knew he was supposed to be learning how to burn, but… he didn’t know how. He was going to keep failing no matter how hard he tried. And then Kelsier’s words hit him and he stared down at him, eyes wide. “Do… I have permission to burn tin? Or… flare… tin?”

Nico blinked, eyes widening just a little bit at the soft reprimand. It wasn’t really a reprimand, just a comment. One that Nico hadn’t expected. If you respected someone, you called them Lord, even if they weren’t the head of a House. It was complicated, but Nico had been taught by Minos to call everyone Lord, if he spoke with them. Not that he’d had much experience talking to noblemen in the past several years. It was odd to think that he hadn’t had the normal life of a noble Mistborn. He had assumed that every Mistborn child was taken like he had been, trained until they were able to reenter society. It didn’t take more than a week or two for most Mistborn, so he wouldn’t notice their absence. Nico was just… an exceptionally slow learner. A fool. Maybe not even worthy of being a real Mistborn. He shook the thought away, instead focusing on Kelsier.
“Sorry,” he mumbled, shoving his hands into his pockets and squeezing them into fists to try to ground himself again. He wouldn’t call anyone in the crew ‘Lord’ again, even if they acted like they deserved it. Nico wasn’t sure that he liked Breeze, but the man carried himself like a nobleman. He acted like he was from a noble family. He had the “I’m better than you” airs absolutely mastered. Nico decided not to mention that to Kelsier. He didn’t think the Survivor would appreciate anyone criticizing his crew.
The soft sound that came from Kelsier surprised Nico, and he found himself tensing as he tried to figure out what it was. Laughter? It had been a long time since he had heard it, and when Minos laughed it was hard and cruel. There was no humor in it. Besides, Nico didn’t know what he had said that Kelsier might find funny.
“That sounds like a great way to get yourself killed,” he said after a long moment, looking around. He didn’t have anything other than tin, but he still thought Kelsier allowing him to do anything (within reason) was stupid. Did he believe that Nico wouldn’t try anything, or was he confident in his ability to handle it if he did?
Before he could overthink it, Nico began to flare tin, trying for a moment to reduce it down to a burn. Nothing happened. The boy let out a frustrated groan, then glanced at Kelsier. No one looks up anymore. That’s what the Survivor had said.
Nico angled his chin up, feeling rather foolish as he did so. There was nothing to see in the sky. Nothing… Nico’s eyes widened and a gasp escaped his lips. The mists were still there, of course, but they were transparent to Nico’s tin-enhanced eyes, as they always were. But Nico had never looked up. The moon was always too bright to risk it… there were lights, suspended in the dark blue sky. It was like… Nico struggled and failed for a few moments to think of a metaphor, then let the thought sink away.
There are metals in the surface of the world. They were mixed in with the other elements there, forming the dirt and the stones of the streets of Luthadel. Nico knew they were there, even with the trace amounts of steel in his stomach. He wasn’t thinking about that, though. His body acted on instinct, Pushing up against the metal in the ground, one hand reaching for the stars. There wasn’t enough steel to flare. But there was enough to burn. Nico hung in the sky, eyes shining, starlight reflecting off them as he reached. It was as though he could touch them. For a moment, nothing hurt. For a moment, Nico floated. For a moment, Nico burned.

Nico may not have lived with the Skaa, but he knew what it was like to keep one eye open at all times. He knew what it was like to know that he could be killed at any moment. He hadn’t thought Minos would actually kill him because hew asn’t useful, he just knew that training could end in his death if he wasn’t good enough. He had never been good enough for Minos. He had failed almost every test, but it had made him better. He had learned when he failed. He had learned to keep moving forward, to keep pushing forward even when he had nothing to give. He had learned that his safety meant nothing if he wasn’t useful. He had been honed and forged like a weapon, stronger because of the pressure and the heat. You discarded a weapon when it wasn’t useful, but only after you had started using it. When you were forging a weapon it didn’t do to throw it out until you were certain that nothing could be made from it.
This was different. Life with Kelsier and his crew… Nico knew he wasn’t free, but it felt a lot more like freedom than training with Minos had. He was allowed to see the outside. He was allowed to see the mists, to play in them and learn things at his own pace. He was allowed to say what he wanted to eat, if there was more than one option available. He was allowed to use his time how he wanted. Minos would never have allowed him to waste time drawing. He knew he was likely only allowed because the Survivor didn’t have time to train him every hour of every day, but… he liked having time to himself. He liked being allowed to choose a hobby. He liked watching himself improve. He had only been working at it for a few weeks, but he had already started to see some improvement. Nothing he drew was realistic yet, but… he was getting close.
Nico had the distinct impression that he wanted to draw this. The way the stars burned through the mist, the way they hung in the sky just as Nico did, the way they made everything around them just a little bit lighter. Nico could picture it on paper, but he knew he would go through a lot of sheets before he managed to come even close to capturing it. He wanted to learn how.
There were tears burning in Nico’s eyes, but he wasn’t certain how they got there. It was like his chest was tight, something pressing in on him, and the only way to be released from it was to get up higher. To touch these lights, to find out what they were…
Nico wasn’t aware he had started burning. He had no recollection of how he had ended up in the sky. All he knew was the feeling of weightlessness, and then the pull of gravity as his steel ran out. He tumbled to the ground, catching himself and rolling to a stop on the hard stone, breathless but unharmed. He rolled over one more time, ignoring the dirt and tears on his clothing from rolling. He hadn’t been up too high. Besides… he could still see the stars… Nico didn’t even try to stand up, just lay there on the ground, eyes and heart full.
“What are those?” Nico breathed eventually, not daring to tear his gaze away from them. He didn’t know what might make them disappear.

Nico heard Kelsier’s laughter die away, he heard the way he came just a little bit closer, the way he settled on the ground… this wasn’t Nico’s moment alone. This was a moment he had to share with Kelsier, but… in truth, he didn’t mind. He breathed out, eyes wide as he tried to take it all in. There were so many of them… Nico wanted to count them, but he knew he would be there for a very long time if he did. It was almost as though there was another world in the sky, one that they couldn’t quite reach. Most people never saw this. It was a secret shared by Mistborn and Tineyes, and nobody else had any idea there were lights so high above Scadrial. They weren’t very bright, but they were bright enough that Nico felt he might be able to pierce the inky blue if he got close enough.
“Stars,” Nico breathed, the tears spilling from his eyes and tracing their way down the side of his face. They cut through the thin layer of ash he’d picked up from rolling. He as lucky he hadn’t Pushed himself too much higher. It didn’t occur to him to wonder how he had managed it without metals. Later he might wonder if Kelsier was angry with him for being able to use metals he hadn’t been given. He didn’t know how he had access to them, just that… he’d had enough steel to be able to fly, if only for a moment.
It wasn’t fair that only a few people could see the stars. It wasn’t fair that most people would never even know they were there. The world wasn’t built to be fair. Even without the divides between noble and Skaa… what sort of world was it when there was something this beautiful that only a small portion of people alive could access it? It wasn’t right. Nico felt the injustice deep in his bones.
“Where do they come from?” Nico asked, his voice almost inaudible. Awestruck, he wasn’t thinking of how likely Kelsier was to punish him for asking questions. He had always been naturally curious, but he’d suppressed it since Minos had found him. Seeing the stars seemed to have pulled it free.

Nico knew he would never forgive Kelsier for killing Bianca. That didn’t mean, however, that he would never warm to him. It didn’t mean that he would hate him forever. He didn’t think he hated him anymore. What he felt was more… complicated. Kelsier had been kind during training. Kelsier hadn’t killed him. Kelsier had brought him here with the express purpose of seeing the stars. Nobody had done anything that kind for him since before Bianca had been killed. It was possible that nobody had ever done anything this kind for him. He took a deep breath, letting his eyes close for just a moment before he opened them again to make sure that the stars were still there. He wasn’t able to burn the tin to make it last longer, but… flaring still let him see them. He doubted he would be able to see them as well if he were just burning, but… he didn’t know how to do that, so it didn’t matter. They were almost bright enough to see by.
“They’ve been here all along?” Nico asked, voice almost breaking at the words. They had just been here, blazing and bright and magic like… like nothing would ever be able to take them away from the sky. This was one thing the Lord Ruler couldn’t touch. One thing that nobody could take away, even with the mists.
“Do you know any of the myths?” Nico shifted, finally rolling so he could see Kelsier better than he could see the stars. He felt like a little kid again, waiting for Bianca to tell him another story instead of going to bed when he should have. He didn’t know if Kelsier would have these answers, but… there was nothing in the way of his questions. It was almost as though fear couldn’t exist in this moment. They were protected from the reality of the world, at least until Nico’s tin ran out. His eyes shone as he searched Kelsier’s, waiting for the story.

Nico hadn’t believed Kelsier’s promises. He wasn’t sure he believed them, now, but… he was a little bit more inclined to, now. In the world he was used to, this would have been a way to get Nico to do something for Kelsier, but… he hadn’t asked for anything. This didn’t seem like manipulation, it just felt… genuine. Kelsier was answering his questions without reprimanding him for them, he was watching Nico and sharing in the absolute awe and joy the stars inspired. Nico had no idea what they were or how they existed, but… he thought he wanted to know. He would dedicate his life to finding out, if there was any way to do that. There wouldn’t be, of course, unless the Lord Ruler was gone. Unless there was someone in charge who would let someone like Nico study the stars. Someone who wouldn’t mind a boy who was practically Skaa launch himself at the sky.
“Always,” Nico echoed, just as quietly. He was grateful that Kelsier was speaking in a lower voice – the tin amplified everything in a way that was often painful, but Kelsier seemed to be doing everything he could to make this as enjoyable as possible. Nico was going to be indebted to him forever. For the first time… it actually felt like there might be a future in store for Nico. He hadn’t let himself hope before now. He had lived each day half believing that he would be dead by the end of it. Maybe… this was a turning point. Or maybe it was just a moment where things felt like things might be okay. Moments passed. This one might, too.
Nico squinted up at the sky, trying to make out the patterns. He could see them now, the way they seemed to connect, as though you could draw invisible lines between them to make shapes.
“He holds people’s secrets, even now?” Nico asked, eyes wide as he looked up at the shape. He could see the dog. It looked… kind. Or maybe it only looked that way because Nico knew the story. If he told the dog a secret, would he hold onto it like he had the others? Nico forced himself to breathe, trying to stop the tears from falling faster. He wasn’t upset. He wasn’t sad. He just… he hadn’t been allowed a moment like this in longer than he could remember. It felt like breathing fresh air after years underground.

Nico put more stock in promises than most people did. Most people wanted their promises kept, of course, but it wasn’t a matter of life or death if they weren’t’. They would be upset for a few days, perhaps, but… in Nico’s eyes, promises were sacred. He had withstood so much under Minos, but the one thing that had made him snap was the fact that Minos had no intention to keep the promise he had made. The only thing Nico wanted was to avenge Bianca, and Minos hadn’t been willing to let that happen. Nico was to important a weapon, it seemed, to throw away on the Survivor of Hathsin. Nico had never wanted to be a weapon. He had just wanted to get some sort of justice for the death of his sister. He understood now that it was this same justice the Skaa were seeking. At least the nobility cared when one of their own died. At least there were people who would do what they could to make sure the children were safe. The Skaa lost children daily and nobody even blinked an eye. It was cruel. That, too, was unfair. Nico was learning bit by bit that most of the world was unfair in ways he hadn’t even considered before.
A world where everyone could see the stars would never have ended with children dying on the streets on a daily basis. It just… couldn’t happen.
“Have you given him a secret?” Nico asked, tilting his head to look at the sky again, then glancing back at Kelsier, eyes wide. It wasn’t meant to be a probing question. He wouldn’t ask what the secret was, if the answer was yes. Nico didn’t know if he had any secrets that were worth giving away. Maybe one day he would. Maybe there was a secret he was keeping from himself, one that was too big and scary to admit even in the privacy of his own mind. It had felt, for years, like his mind hadn’t been that private after all.
Nico lifted a hand to his cheek, wiping away the tears and smearing the ash where it had gotten wet. It didn’t do much… the tears fell anyway, not seeming to stop now that they had been allowed to fall.