You asked why I smile, Goodman Mennis? Well, the Lord Ruler thinks he has claimed laughter and joy for himself. I'm disinclined to let him do so. This is one battle that doesn't take very much effort to fight.
In a moment of stillness—staring at the shifting mists that made up the walls of the cavernous room—he admitted a deeper secret to himself.
He hadn’t been completely sane since the Pits.
I decided that I’d see her dream fulfilled. I’d make a world where flowers returned, a world with green plants, a world where no soot fell from the sky… I know. I’m insane.
It was supremely frustrating, but sometime during his second month of imprisonment he admitted the truth to himself. Writing wasn’t all that important.
"You're fighting it already, Goodman Mennis. You're just losing terribly." Kelsier shrugged. "But, what do I know? I'm just a traveling miscreant, here to eat your food and impress your youths."
“Thing is, while they were correct to question my sanity, they never did have the right reasoning. It’s not my ambition that should worry them.”
“Then what should?”
Kelsier smiled.
“How do you ‘accidentally’ kill a nobleman in his own mansion?”
“With a knife in the chest. Or, rather, a pair of knives in the chest - it always pays to be careful.”
Before, the high nobility had feared him. It had taken a trap set by the Lord Ruler himself to capture Kelsier. Now... the Final Empire itself would shake before he was finished with it.