Even in the darkness, Marasi could see the curiosity on Waxillium’s face. Despite the men shouting below, the muffled sound of gunshots, he was still the lawman—the detective. Questions teased him. He stepped over to the straps, picked them up, and held them firmly, bracing himself with his feet on the floor.

“Ready,” he said.

“A moment,” the masked man said, reaching for a lever. He yanked it hard, and the entire room shook, then slid sideways. Out of the hull, like a drawer in a dresser being opened. Marasi could see out of the front end now, which proved to have a large glass window that had been blocked by wood earlier.

“Go!” the man said.

Waxillium must have Pushed, for the room shook, then rose into the air. They weren’t in a room at all, but in a small boat that could detach from the main vessel.

21

Wax stood in the center of the small vessel, Pushing against some kind of plate down below, designed—obviously—for this very purpose. It would be attached to the shelf the vessel had been on—not something that rose with it, but some kind of launchpad for an Allomancer to use as an anchor.

This vessel, though tiny, should still have been too heavy to lift. He should have broken those straps he held to, or been crushed by the force of his own Push. Yet he managed it. He held to those straps—essentially hitching himself to the ship—and lifted it, with all the people inside, off a ledge that had extended from the mother vessel.

It’s those medallions, he realized. They allow everyone to do as I do—to make themselves light, nearly as light as air. That meant he was really only lifting the ship itself, along with their equipment.

The vehicle was small—barely six feet wide, though it was maybe twice as long—and had wide openings like doorways on either side. Those had faced walls inside the pocketlike shelf they’d popped out of, but now they exposed the air.

All in all, the thing felt like the cab of a motorcar with the doors ripped off. As the craft rose, small pontoons on extended arms folded down and clicked into place. Wax had a brief view of surprised soldiers on the portion of the catwalk he hadn’t broken, and then they were out, rising through the opening in the warehouse roof.

The strange man in the red mask scrambled through the vehicle and leaned out one of the holes in the walls to look downward. He looked solemn as he saluted the ship below, then bowed his head, whispering something.

Finally, he turned to Wax. “You are doing great, O Divine One!”

“I’m not going to be able to Push it much higher,” Wax said with a grunt. “The anchor is too far away.”

“You shouldn’t need to,” the man said, scrambling past Marasi—he patted her on the shoulder—then fiddling with some controls at the front of the machine. “I’ll need the primer cube, please,” he said, holding out a hand to Wayne.