A forest that was not there yesterday

[unprophesied_of_ages]

The Lord Ruler is in his palace, when he sees a sight he hasn't seen in centuries. Trees, sunlight...is he hallucinating? The fact that there's a forest in his living room isn't the surprising part. The fact that there's a forest on his planet is. As soon as he walks through the door to where his living room isn't, it's definitely not a hallucination.

His stores of Allomantic metals abruptly disappear. They're still physically there, but the power is completely gone. He immediately turns to go back, only to see more forest.

At least his Feruchemy still works—he can tell because he's still alive—but that won't last him forever. He only has so much stored youth, and without both sets of abilities he can't replenish it. He hasn't been in so much danger since the beheading that one time. Returning to Scadrial is the highest and currently only priority. If spontaneous forests are a thing, he needs to find someone who can explain them and more importantly how to get back.

The next few hours are spent walking in an essentially randomly chosen direction, with the sun to his right. He's quite certain that suns are supposed to be moving across the sky, but that's not a pressing emergency. He already knew he wasn't on his own planet when he saw proper trees and plants instead of ash-covered monstrosities. Whenever he calls out, nobody responds. If it's an empty spontaneous forest, he's probably doomed.

After some time, he hears his stomach growl. He hasn't seen much that looks edible, but possibly that's just because he's not used to real plants. Berries. Berries used to exist. Those berries look tasty, and if they're poisonous it's not like he needs to worry about it. As always, he has a truly ridiculous amount of stored health in his gold jewelry. Tapping gold just in case, he eats a handful.

Comments

[unprophesied_of_ages]

"That works. I'll have the other end blocked off if I have to, and nobody'll fall through in the immediate future."

[imeanforever]

"Good."

There is a pause, then, "I've cast. Go ahead and try it in case it was lucky harmonics."

[unprophesied_of_ages]

Alendi walks around it so that the stick is on his left, steps forward, and steps through.

His description was apparently precise enough to lead to Luthadel, but not to the palace. He's above another quarter of the city, far above it in fact. He spends a few seconds falling, before he treats himself to a very un-Lord Ruler-like cheer while burning steel to Push off a metallic something-or-other below him and launch himself toward Kredik Shaw. He's an Allomancer again.

[imeanforever]

And Promise smiles and shuts the gate and flies away.

[unprophesied_of_ages]

Alendi—no, the Lord Ruler— enters his palace through the door reserved for Mistborn. Or, as others might call it, an upper-story window.

The first order of business is resuming the Soothing of the population. With him gone, lesser Allomancers had to do it. He was gone for less than a day, but it's enough for a noticeable difference to crime and discontent. He replenishes his metals and starts burning brass. Any negative emotions within his range will decrease, and the people will be more content under his rule.

With that back to normal, he publishes a decree through the Canton of Orthodoxy. All new children, noble and skaa, are to have their birth names kept secret. People might not know why he's ordering that yet, but they don't have to.

And finally, he eats. Even with fully charged gold, not eating can get inconvenient.

[imeanforever]

It is about a month - reckoning by the nearest location in Fairyland with a consistent day cycle - when Promise scrambles into the thicket, reopens her gate with a thought, and bursts through.

[unprophesied_of_ages]

She finds herself in the air above a city. It's hotter than she's used to, but there is no visible sun and the air is thick with ash. Below her are streets and canals, both filled with people. In one direction are several castles (eleven if she's counting) one of which appears to be made almost entirely of towers and spires. To the other side are smaller buildings and wide fields.

[imeanforever]

Eugh. She coughs and blinks away as much ash as she can. Pity sorcery doesn't work in the mortal world.

...Except she's still invisible, so that puts paid to that theory. Where did she even read that? She can't remember.

She hovers, invisible, peering at the landscape. It's so strange-looking. And the air is gross. Are there any less ashy areas?

[unprophesied_of_ages]

The ash is everywhere. There may be less of it if she either flies east away from the mountain or enters any building.

[imeanforever]

She descends to the city lowest roof-level, trying to find someplace she can park for a bit without being found or committing home invasion. If she doesn't find out where exactly Alendi is, then if her pursuers catch her she won't necessarily bring anybody else along with her, but she really wants to get out of the ash while she's lying low.

[unprophesied_of_ages]

Most of the buildings have wide eaves exactly because of the ash. Hugging walls would at least kind of alleviate the constant rain of ash.
Some of the establishments are open to the public, but her only way of determining which ones is by seeing which have crowds of people going in and out.

[imeanforever]

Promise decides to perch on the exterior of a windowsill belonging to a building thus crowded. She is invisible and will not spoil anyone's view.

When she is thusly perched she starts what is probably an ultimately futile effort to get ash out of her hair.

[unprophesied_of_ages]

Ash comes out. It'd take more work to get all of it, but it's fairly easy to make her hair recognizably her hair instead of just a convenient holder for ash.
This might have something to do with how common hats are here.

[imeanforever]

Promise did not have time to pack a hat in her sudden flight.

Perch perch. Eavesdropping. She's going to want to stay until she's almost too hungry to fly back to the gate; she may as well listen to public conversations.

[unprophesied_of_ages]

Nobody complains about the ash. It's taken for granted. Nor do they mention the Lord Ruler. So is he.

Promise will hear quite a bit against the nobles. Over the course of eavesdropping, she'll hear that they allegedly treat the non-nobles as essentially tools useful mainly for enriching whatever House they work for. The speakers, sharing drinks and complaints, aren't advocating doing anything about it, of course. Just commenting on how they're worked to the bone and barely paid.
According to one person, "we city skaa" are actually the lucky ones. The plantation workers get beaten if they don't work and killed if they can't. Thirdhand rumors say that some skaa halfway across the empire are allowed to own land.

[imeanforever]

Promise tentatively suspects that she doesn't much approve of this place. She listens more anyway, because she is not yet accustomed to the conditions of this windowsill to make an ash-shooing spell before she flies out in the sky again.

[unprophesied_of_ages]

Further rumors about the hated Them suggest that some have superhuman powers, and that you never know which of them might be able to fly into the air or stab you from behind while standing six feet in front of you. Promise will have to decide how credible the rumors are, but most everyone else seems to believe them.

[imeanforever]

Well, she has superhuman powers and can fly into the air and could probably figure out how to pull off the stabbing trick if motivated; the interesting question is if these Them are supposed to be non-fairies.

[unprophesied_of_ages]

Nobody suggests that the nobles aren't human, but if Luthadel is ruled by an upper class of fairies then the population might not have to know about it.

[imeanforever]

Yes, she's gathering that.

When she has figured out a way to repel ash from herself as she flies, she casts that, and then takes off and goes to sit somewhere else and hear different gossip.

[unprophesied_of_ages]

At the next conveniently open window, some better-dressed people are talking about news from outside the city. Apparently House Elarial lost another shipment of something-or-other from Fadrex City because of bandits; this is speculated to be the cover story for an act of a rival Great House. To the people who aren't up to date on party politics (which is most of them), the event matters only because the ongoing problem means more demand for local goods. Anyone who actually cares about which Great House scored against which is likely to be doing their talking nearer one of the castles.

[imeanforever]

She tries a castle next.

[unprophesied_of_ages]

The nearest occupants are engaged in a popular sport among higher nobility, speculation on who might be a Mistborn. House Elarial has invited some members of an otherwise unimportant family of lesser nobles to Luthadel, so the outsiders are immediately suspected of having something nonobvious to offer them.
Consensus is that House Buvidas has one, but as required by etiquette no speculation about who it is has any facts behind it. A group of skaa thieves including several Mistings tried to raid that keep, but got mysteriously captured and the Mistings turned over to the Lord Ruler's people.

[imeanforever]

Alendi didn't mention a Lord Ruler. Not even when the Queen came up in conversation.

[unprophesied_of_ages]

Aside from a brief reference to his palace being at the Hill of a Thousand Spires, the Lord Ruler isn't mentioned again. Very little about him is news.
The eavesdropees are back to speculating. If the Elarials are getting a new Allomancer, is it going to shift any important power balances? What is their allied House getting out of it, if anything other than improved social standing? Nobody has actual answers to these, but they can easily entertain themselves with crackpot theories along the lines of Salmen Elarial hiring a Mistborn assassin to eliminate Chanil Urbain over a romantic rivalry.