Some Notes

Here we have another of my attempts to space out climaxes. Sazed’s character climax—the first, and perhaps most important of his climactic chapters—comes here after Spook’s climax, but before the book really begins to end. I hope I squeezed this into the right place.

Before I talk about Sazed’s revelation, however, let’s do a few notes. First off, Spook is alive. Yes, I let him live. He earned it, for one, and for another, there is something very important he still needs to do. You’ll see.

Either way, I think—with the number of viewpoint characters I’ve killed in my books—that I’ve earned the right to have someone survive a very dangerous situation like Spook went through.

Also, as a note, Alendi was an Allomancer, as the epigraph notes here. He had to be—he heard the pulsing at the Well of Ascension when nobody else could. “Ah,” you might say, “but I thought that you said Allomancy didn’t exist before those beads.” That isn’t 100% true. The legends say that Allomancy came with the Deepness. Alendi was one of the very first Allomancers, and he gained his powers as the mists began to cover the world.

That’s important. 😉

Sazed’s Character Climax

It’s both fascinating and worrisome for me to write about religion. As a religious person, it’s not my goal in these books to insult those who don’t have a religious belief themselves. However, I find faith—my own included—to be a fascinating thing, worthy of study and introspection.

And so I write in characters like Sazed, who think about these things and wrestle with them. He voices here some of my own frustrations and fears regarding religion. It is hard to believe, sometimes, in the face of some of the terrible things that religion has done in the world. The rationalization required for faith is sometimes difficult to justify.

But, on the other hand, I have seen beauty, peace, and love brought by religion. I have seen and felt things that seemed miracles to me at the time. Do I discard that?

I feel faith is important. Or, at least, it is to me. And so we have Sazed’s struggle. There is a lot more to come; I didn’t give him an easy answer in the form of the Terris religion. (Though I hope the reader is expecting one, as I always like to surprise you.)