Kneeling in the middle of the field, I stared at the light. That beautiful glow, that powerful something beyond.
There are things greater than the Epics, I thought. There is life, and love, and nature herself.
Steelheart strode toward me.
Where there are villains, there will be heroes. My father’s voice. Just wait. They will come.
Steelheart raised a glowing hand.
Sometimes, son, you have to help the heroes along.…
And suddenly, I knew.
An awareness opened my mind, like the burning radiance of the sun itself. I knew. I understood.
Not looking down, I gathered up my father’s gun. I fiddled with it a moment, then raised it directly at Steelheart.
Steelheart sniffed and stared it down. “Well?”
My hand quivered, wavering, my arm trembling. The sun backlit Steelheart.
“Idiot,” Steelheart said, and reached forward, grabbing my hand and crushing the bones. I barely felt the pain. The gun dropped to the ground with a clank. Steelheart held out a hand and the air spun around on the ground, forming a little whirlwind underneath the gun that raised it into his fingers. He turned it on me.
I looked up at him. A murderer outlined in brilliant light. Seen like that, he was just a shadow. Darkness. A nothingness before real power.
The men in this world, Epics included, would pass from time. I might be a worm to him, but he was a worm himself in the grand scheme of the universe.
His cheek bore a tiny sliver of a scar. The only imperfection on his body. A gift from a man who had believed in him. A gift from a better man than Steelheart would ever be, or ever understand.
“I should have been more careful that day,” Steelheart said.
“My father didn’t fear you,” I whispered.
Steelheart stiffened, gun pointed to my head as I knelt, bloodied, before him. He always liked to use his enemy’s own weapon against him. That was part of the pattern. The wind stirred the smoke rising around us.
“That’s the secret,” I said. “You keep us in darkness. You show off your terrible powers. You kill, you allow the Epics to kill, you turn men’s own weapons against them. You even spread false rumors about how horrible you are, as if you can’t be bothered to be as evil as you want to be. You want us to be afraid …”
Steelheart’s eyes widened.
“… because you can only be hurt by someone who doesn’t fear you,” I said. “But such a person doesn’t really exist, do they? You make sure of it. Even the Reckoners, even Prof himself. Even me. We are all afraid of you. Fortunately I know someone who isn’t afraid of you, and never has been.”
“You know nothing,” he growled.
“I know everything,” I whispered. Then I smiled.
Steelheart pulled the trigger.
Inside the gun, the hammer struck the back of the bullet’s casing. Gunpowder exploded, and the bullet sprang forward, summoned to kill.
In the barrel, it struck the thing I had lodged there. A slender pen, with a button you can click on the top. It was just small enough to fit into the gun. A detonator. Connected to explosives beneath our feet.
The bullet hit the trigger and pushed it in.
I swore I could watch the explosion unfold. Each beat of my heart seemed to take an eternity. Fire channeled upward, steel ground ripping apart like paper. Terrible redness to match the peaceful beauty of the sunrise.
The fire consumed Steelheart and all around him; it ripped his body apart as he opened his mouth to scream. Skin flayed, muscles burned, organs shredded. He turned eyes toward the heavens, consumed by a volcano of fire and fury that opened at his feet. In that fraction of a sliver of a moment, Steelheart—greatest of all Epics—died.
He could only be killed by someone who didn’t fear him.
He had pulled the trigger himself.
He had caused the detonation himself.
And as that arrogant, self-confident sneer implied, Steelheart did not fear himself. He was, perhaps, the only person alive who did not.
I didn’t really have time to smile in that frozen moment, but I was feeling it nonetheless as the fire came for me.
41
I watched the shifting pattern of red, orange, and black. A wall of fire and destruction. I watched it until it vanished. It left a black scar on the ground in front of me, surrounding a hole five paces wide—the blast crater of the explosion.
I watched it all, and found myself still alive. I’ll admit, it was the most baffling moment in my life.
Someone groaned behind me. I spun to see Prof sitting up. His clothing was covered in blood and he had a few scratches on his skin, but his skull was whole. Had I mistaken the extent of his injuries?
Prof had his hand forward, palm out. The tensor he’d been wearing was in tatters. “Sparks,” he said. “Another inch or so and I wouldn’t have been able to stop it.” He coughed into his fist. “You’re a lucky little slontze.”