Then the glow spurted to life, and in an instant Kelsier was consumed. This time he forced himself to look away from Preservation—though it was less a matter of looking, and more a matter of trying to sort through the horrible overload of information and sensation that assaulted him.

Unfortunately, in turning his attention away from Preservation he risked giving it to something else—something equally demanding. There was a second god here, black and terrible, the thing with the spines and spidery legs, sprouting from dark mists and reaching into everything throughout the land.

Including Kelsier.

In fact, his ties to Preservation were trivial by comparison to these hundreds of black fingers which attached him to that thing Beyond. He sensed a powerful satisfaction from it, along with an idea. Not words, just an undeniable fact.

You are mine, Survivor.

Kelsier rebelled at the thought, but in this place of perfect light, truth had to be acknowledged.

Straining, soul crumbling before that terrible reality, Kelsier turned toward the tendrils of light spreading into the distance. Possibilities upon possibilities, compounded upon one another. Infinite, overwhelming. The future.

He dropped out of the vision again, and this time fell to his knees panting. The glow faded, and he was again on the banks of Lake Luthadel. Preservation settled down beside him and rested his hand on Kelsier’s back.

“I can’t stop him,” Kelsier whispered.

“I know,” Preservation said.

“I could see thousands upon thousands of possibilities. In none of them did I defeat that thing.”

“The ribbons of the future are never as useful as … as they should be,” Preservation said. “I rode them much, in the past. It’s too hard to see what is actually likely, and what is just a fragile … fragile, distant maybe.…”

“I can’t stop it,” Kelsier whispered. “I’m too like it. Everything I do serves it.” Kelsier looked up, smiling.

“It broke you,” Preservation said.

“No, Fuzz.” Kelsier laughed, standing. “No. I can’t stop it. No matter what I do, I can’t stop it.” He looked down at Preservation. “But she can.”

“He knows this. You were right. He has been preparing her, infusing her.”

“She can beat it.”

“A frail possibility,” Preservation said. “A false promise.”

“No,” Kelsier said softly. “A hope.”

He held his hand out. Preservation took it and let Kelsier pull him to his feet. God nodded. “A hope. What is our plan?”

“I continue to the west,” Kelsier said. “I saw, in the possibilities…”

“Do not trust what you saw,” Preservation said, sounding far more firm than he had earlier. “It takes an infinite mind to even begin to glean information from those tendrils of the future. Even then you are likely to be wrong.”

“The path I saw started by me going to the west,” Kelsier said. “It’s all I can think to do. Unless you have a better suggestion.”

Preservation shook his head.